' 


VJ 


. 


"l^O, 


i.  i  i 


THE  HEART 
OF  LITTLE  SHIKARA 


fig  EMfimt  Hlaraijall 

The  Voice  of 

the  Pack 

The  Strength 

of  the  Pines 

The  Snowshoe 

Trail 

Shepherds  of 

the  Wild 

The  Sky  Line 

of  Spruce 

THE     HEART 
OF    LITTLE     SHIKARA 

AND  OTHER  STORIES 


BY 


EDISON  MARSHALL 
ff 


BOSTON 

LITTLE,  BROWN,  AND  COMPANY 

1922 


Copyright,  1922, 
By  Little,  Brown,  and  Company. 

All  rights  reserved 
Published  October,  1922 


PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OP  AMERICA 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara i 

Never  Kill  a  Porcupine 38 

Jungle    Justice 61 

Shag  of  the  Packs 86 

The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things 125 

Furs 156 

Little  Death 178 

The  Elephant  Remembers 202 

The  Serpent  City 235 

Brother  Bill  the  Elk 255 


M18G72 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 
and  Other  Stones 

THE   HEART  OF  LITTLE   SHIKARA 

If  it  hadn't  been  for  a  purple  moon  that  came  peering 
up  above  the  dark  jungle  just  at  nightfall,  it  would  have 
been  impossible  to  tell  that  Little  Shikara  was  at  his  watch. 
He  was  really  just  the  color  of  the  shadows — a  rather  pleas- 
ant brown — he  was  very  little  indeed,  and  besides,  he  was 
standing  very,  very  still.  If  he  was  trembling  at  all,  from 
anticipation  and  excitement,  it  was  no  more  than  Nahar  the 
tiger  trembles  as  he  crouches  in  ambush.  But  the  moon  did 
show  him — peering  down  through  the  leaf  clusters  of  the 
heavy  vines — and  shone  very  softly  in  his  wide-open  dark 
eyes. 

And  it  was  a  purple  moon,  no  other  color  that  man  could 
name.  It  looked  almost  unreal,  like  a  paper  moon  painted 
very  badly  by  a  clumsy  stagehand.  The  jungle  moon  quite 
often  has  that  peculiar  purplish  tint,  most  travelers  know, 
but  few  of  them  indeed  ever  try  to  tell  what  causes  it. 
This  particular  moon  probed  down  here  and  there  between 
the  tall  bamboos,  transformed  the  jungle — just  now  waking 
— into  a  mystery  and  a  fairyland,  glinted  on  a  hard-packed 
elephant  trail  that  wound  away  into  the  thickets,  and  always 


2        The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

came  back  to  shine  on  the  coal-black  Oriental  eyes  of  the 
little  boy  beside  the  village  gate.  It  showed  him  standing 
very  straight  and  just  as  tall  as  his  small  stature  would  per- 
mit, .ind  looked  oddly  silvery  and  strange  on  his  long,  dark 
hair.  Little  Shikara,  son  of  Khoda  Dunnoo,  was  waiting  for 
the  return  of  a  certain  idol  and  demigod  who  was  even  now 
riding  home  in  his  howdah  from  the  tiger  hunt. 

Others  of  the  villagers  would  be  down  to  meet  Warwick 
Sahib  as  soon  as  they  heard  the  shouts  of  his  beaters,  but 
Little  Shikara  had  been  waiting  almost  an  hour.  Likely  if 
they  had  known  about  it,  they  would  have  commented  on  his 
badness,  because  he  was  notoriously  bad,  if  indeed — as  the 
villagers  told  each  other — he  was  not  actually  cursed  with 
evil  spirits. 

In  the  first  place,  he  was  almost  valueless  as  a  herder  of 
buffalo.  Three  times,  when  he  had  been  sent  with  the  other 
boys  to  watch  the  herds  in  their  wallows,  he  had  left  his  post 
and  crept  away  into  the  fringe  of  jungle  on  what  was  un- 
questionably some  mission  of  witchcraft.  For  small  naked 
brown  boys,  as  a  rule,  do  not  go  alone  and  unarmed  into  the 
thick  bamboos.  Too  many  things  can  happen  to  prevent 
them  ever  coming  out  again ;  too  many  brown  silent  ribbons 
crawl  in  the  grass,  or  too  many  yellow,  striped  creatures,  no 
less  lithe,  lurk  in  the  thickets.  But  the  strangest  thing  of  all 
— and  the  surest  sign  of  witchcraft — was  that  he  had  always 
come  safely  out  again,  yet  with  never  any  satisfactory  ex- 
planations as  to  why  he  had  gone.  He  had  always  looked 
some  way  very  joyful  and  tremulous,  and  perhaps  even  pale, 
if  from  the  nature  of  things  a  brown  boy  ever  can  look  pale. 
But  it  was  the  kind  of  paleness  that  one  has  after  a  par- 
ticularly exquisite  experience.  It  was  not  the  dumb,  teeth- 
chattering  paleness  of  fear. 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara        3 

"I  saw  the  sergeant  of  the  jungle,"  Little  Shikara  said 
after  one  of  these  excursions.     And  this  made  no  sense  at  all. 

"There  are  none  of  the  king's  soldiers  here,"  the  brown 
village  folk  replied  to  him.  "Either  thou  liest  to  us,  or  thine 
eyes  lied  to  thee.  And  didst  thou  also  see  the  chevron  that 
told  his  rank?" 

"That  was  the  way  I  knew  him.  It  was  the  black  bear, 
and  he  wore  the  pale  chevron  low  on  his  throat." 

This  was  Little  Shikara  all  over.  Of  course  he  referred 
to  the  black  Himalayan  bear  which  all  men  know  wears  a 
yellowish  patch,  of  chevron  shape,  just  in  front  of  his  fore 
legs;  but  why  he  should  call  him  a  jungle-sergeant  was  quite 
beyond  the  wit  of  the  village  folk  to  say.  Their  imagination 
did  not  run  in  that  direction.  It  never  even  occurred  to  them 
that  Little  Shikara  might  be  a  born  jungle  creature,  ex- 
patriated by  the  accident  of  birth, — one  of  that  free,  strange 
breed  that  can  never  find  peace  in  the  villages  of  men. 

"But  remember  the  name  we  gave  him,"  his  mother  would 
say.    "Perhaps  he  is  only  living  up  to  his  name." 

For  there  are  certain  native  hunters  in  India  that  are 
known,  far  and  wide,  as  the  Shikaris;  and  possibly  she  meant 
in  her  tolerance  that  her  little  son  was  merely  a  born  hunts- 
man. But  in  reality  Little  Shikara  was  not  named  for  these 
men  at  all.  Rather  it  was  for  a  certain  fleet-winged  little 
hawk,  a  hunter  of  sparrows,  that  is  one  of  the  most  free 
spirits  in  all  the  jungle. 

And  it  was  almost  like  taking  part  in  some  great  hunt 
himself — to  be  waiting  at  the  gate  for  the  return  of  Warwick 
Sahib.  Even  now,  the  elephant  came  striding  out  of  the 
shadows ;  and  Little  Shikara  could  see  the  trophy.  The  hunt 
had  indeed  been  successful,  and  the  boy's  glowing  eyes  beheld 
— even  in  the  shadows — the  largest,  most  beautiful  tiger-skin 


4        The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

he  had  ever  seen.  It  was  the  great  Nahar,  the  royal  tiger, 
who  had  killed  one  hundred  cattle  from  near-by  fields. 

Warwick  Sahib  rode  in  his  howdah;  and  he  did  not  seem 
to  see  the  village  people  that  came  out  to  meet  him.  In 
truth,  he  seemed  half-asleep,  his  muscles  limp,  his  gray 
eyes  full  of  thoughts.  He  made  no  answer  to  the  triumph- 
ant shouts  of  the  village  folk.  Little  Shikara  glanced  once 
at  the  lean  bronze  face,  the  limp,  white,  thin  hands,  and 
something  like  a  shiver  of  ecstasy  went  clear  to  his  ten  toes. 
For  like  many  other  small  boys,  all  over  the  broad  world, 
he  was  a  hero-worshiper  to  the  last  hair  of  his  head;  and 
this  quiet  man  on  the  elephant  was  to  him  beyond  all  meas- 
ure the  most  wonderful  living  creature  on  the  earth. 

He  didn't  cry  out,  as  the  others  did.  He  simply  stood 
in  mute  worship,  his  little  body  tingling  with  glory.  War- 
wick Sahib  had  looked  up  now,  and  his  slow  eyes  were 
sweeping  the  line  of  brown  faces.  But  still  he  did  not 
seem  to  see  them.  And  then — wonder  of  wonders — his  eyes 
rested  full  on  the  eyes  of  his  little  worshiper  beside  the  gate. 

But  it  was  quite  the  way  of  Warwick  Sahib  to  sweep 
his  gray,  tired-out  eyes  over  a  scene  and  seemingly  perceive 
nothing ;  yet  in  reality  absorb  every  detail  with  the  accuracy 
of  a  photographic  plate.  And  his  seeming  indifference  was 
not  a  pose  with  him,  either.  He  was  just  a  great  sportsman 
who  was  also  an  English  gentleman,  and  he  had  learned 
certain  lessons  of  impassiveness  from  the  wild.  Only  one  of 
the  brown  faces  he  beheld  was  worth  a  lingering  glance. 
And  when  he  met  that  one  his  eyes  halted  in  their  sweeping 
survey, — and  Warwick  Sahib  smiled. 

That  face  was  the  brown,  eager  visage  of  Little  Shikara. 
And  the  blood  of  the  boy  flowed  to  the  skin,  and  he  glowed 
red  all  over  through  the  brown. 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara        5 

It  was  only  the  faintest  of  quiet,  tolerant  smiles;  but  it 
meant  more  to  him  than  almost  any  kind  of  an  honor  could 
have  meant  to  the  prematurely  gray  man  in  the  howdah. 
The  latter  passed  on  to  his  estate,  and  some  of  the  villagers 
went  back  to  their  women  and  their  thatch  huts.  But 
still  little  Shikara  stood  motionless,  and  it  wasn't  until  the 
thought  suddenly  came  to  him  that  possibly  the  beaters  had 
already  gathered  and  were  telling  the  story  of  the  kill 
that  with  startling  suddenness  he  raced  back  through  the 
gates  to  the  village. 

Yes,  the  beaters  had  assembled  in  a  circle  under  a  tree, 
and  most  of  the  villagers  had  gathered  to  hear  the  story.  He 
slipped  in  among  them  and  listened  with  both  outstanding 
little  ears.  Warwick  Sahib  had  dismounted  from  his 
elephant  as  usual,  the  beaters  said,  and  with  but  one  at- 
tendant had  advanced  up  the  bed  of  a  dry  creek.  This  was 
quite  like  Warwick  Sahib,  and  Little  Shikara  felt  himself 
tingling  again.  Other  hunters,  particularly  many  of  the 
rich  sahibs  from  across  the  sea,  shot  their  tigers  from  the 
security  of  the  howdah;  but  this  wasn't  Warwick's  way  of 
doing.  The  male  tiger  had  risen  snarling  from  his  lair 
and  had  been  felled  at  the  first  shot. 

Most  of  the  villagers  had  supposed  that  the  story  would 
end  at  this  point.  Warwick  Sahib's  tiger  hunts  were  usually 
just  such  simple  and  expeditious  affairs.  The  gun  would 
lift  to  his  shoulder,  the  quiet  eyes  would  glance  along  the 
barrel,  and  the  tiger,  whether  charging  or  standing  still, 
would  speedily  die.  But  to-day  there  had  been  a  curious 
epilogue.  Just  as  the  beaters  had  started  toward  the  fallen 
animal,  and  the  white  Heaven-born 's  cigaret-case  was  open 
in  his  hand,  Nahara,  Nahar's  great,  tawny  mate,  had  sud- 
denly sprung  forth  from  the  bamboo  thickets. 


6        The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

She  drove  straight  at  the  nearest  of  the  beaters.  There 
was  no  time  whatever  for  Warwick  to  take  aim.  His  rifle 
leaped,  like  a  live  thing,  in  his  arms,  but  not  one  of 
the  horrified  beaters  had  seen  his  eyes  lower  to  the  sights. 
Yet  the  bullet  went  home;  they  could  tell  by  the  way  the 
tiger  flashed  to  her  breast  in  the  grass. 

Yet  she  was  only  wounded.  One  of  the  beaters,  starting, 
had  permitted  a  bough  of  a  tree  to  whip  Warwick  in  the 
face,  and  the  blow  had  disturbed  what  little  aim  he  had. 
It  was  almost  a  miracle  that  he  had  hit  the  great  cat  at 
all.  At  once  the  thickets  had  closed  around  her,  and  the 
beaters  had  been  unable  to  drive  her  forth  again. 

The  circle  was  silent  thereafter.  They  seemed  to  be 
waiting  for  Khusru,  one  of  the  head  men  of  the  village, 
to  give  his  opinion.  He  knew  more  about  the  wild  animals 
than  any  mature  native  in  the  assembly,  and  his  com- 
ments on  the  hunting  stories  were  usually  worth  hearing. 

"We  will  not  be  in  the  honored  service  of  the  Protector 
of  the  Poor  at  this  time  a  year  from  now,"  he  said. 

They  all  waited  tensely.  Shikara  shivered.  "Speak, 
Khusru,"  they  urged  him. 

"Warwick  Sahib  will  go  again  to  the  jungles — and 
Nahara  will  be  waiting.  She  owes  two  debts.  One  is  the 
killing  of  her  mate — and  ye  know  that  these  two  tigers  have 
been  long  and  faithful  mates.  Do  ye  think  she  will  let  that 
debt  go  unpaid?     She  will  also  avenge  her  own  wound." 

"Perhaps  she  will  die  of  bleeding,"  one  of  the  others 
suggested. 

"Nay,  or  ye  would  have  found  her  this  afternoon.  Ye 
know  that  it  is  the  wounded  tiger  that  is  most  to  be  feared. 
One  day,  and  he  will  go  forth  in  pursuit  of  her  again;  and 
then  ye  will  not  see  him   riding  back  so  grandly  on  his 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara        7 

elephant.  Perhaps  she  will  come  here,  to  carry  away  our 
children." 

Again  Shikara  tingled,  hoping  that  Nahara  would  at 
least  come  close  enough  to  cause  excitement.  And  that 
night,  too  happy  to  keep  silent,  he  told  his  mother  of 
Warwick  Sahib's  smile.  "And  some  time  I — I,  thine  own 
son,"  he  said,  as  sleepiness  came  upon  him,  "will  be  a 
killer  of  tigers,  even  as  Warwick  Sahib." 

"Little  sparrow-hawk,"  his  mother  laughed  at  him.  "Lit- 
tle one  of  mighty  words,  only  the  great  sahibs  that  come 
from  afar,  and  Warwick  Sahib  himself  may  hunt  the  tiger. 
So  how  canst  thou,  little  worthless?" 

"I  will  soon  be  grown,"  he  persisted,  "and  I — I  too — 
will  sometime  return  with  such  a  tiger  skin  as  the  great 
Heaven-born  brought  this  afternoon."  Little  Shikara  was 
very  sleepy,  and  he  was  telling  his  dreams  much  more  frankly 
than  was  his  wont.  "And  the  village  folk  will  come  out 
to  meet  me  with  shoutings,  and  I  will  tell  them  of  the 
shot — in  the  circle  under  the  tree." 

"And  where,  little  hawk,  wilt  thou  procure  thine  ele- 
phants, and  such  rupees  as  are  needed?" 

"Warwick  Sahib  shoots  from  the  ground — and  so  will 
I.  And  sometimes  he  goes  forth  with  only  one  attendant 
— and  I  will  not  need  even  one.  And  who  can  say — per- 
haps he  will  find  me  even  a  bolder  man  than  Gunga  Singhai  ; 
and  he  will  take  me  in  his  place  on  the  hunts  in  the  jungles." 

For  Gunga  Singhai  was  Warwick  Sahib's  own  personal 
attendant  and  gun  carrier,  the  native  that  the  Protector 
of  the  Poor  could  trust  in  the  tightest  places.  So  it  was 
only  to  be  expected  that  Little  Shikara's  mother  should 
laugh  at  him.  The  idea  of  her  son  being  an  attendant 
of  Warwick  Sahib,  not  to  mention  a  hunter  of  tigers,  was 


8        The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

only  a  tale  to  tell  her  husband  when  the  boy's  bright  eyes 
were  closed  in  sleep. 

"Nay,  little  man,"  she  told  him.  "Would  I  want  thee 
torn  to  pieces  in  Nahara's  claws  ?  Would  I  want  thee  smell- 
ing of  the  jungle  again,  as  thou  didst  after  chasing  the  water- 
buck  through  the  bamboos?  Nay — thou  wilt  be  a  herds- 
man, like  thy  father — and  perhaps  gather  many  rupees." 

But  Little  Shikara  did  not  want  to  think  of  rupees.  Even 
now,  as  sleep  came  to  him,  his  childish  spirit  had  left 
the  circle  of  thatch  roofs  and  had  gone  on  tremulous  ex- 
peditions into  the  jungle.  Far  away,  the  trumpet  call  of 
a  wild  tusker  trembled  through  the  moist,  hot  night;  and 
great  bell-shaped  flowers  made  the  air  pungent  and  heavy 
with  perfume.  A  tigress  skulked  somewhere  in  a  thicket 
licking  an  injured  leg  with  her  rough  tongue,  pausing  to 
listen  to  every  sound  the  night  gave  forth.  Little  Shikara 
whispered  in  his  sleep. 

A  half  mile  distant,  in  his  richly  furnished  bungalow, 
Warwick  Sahib  dozed  over  his  after-dinner  cigar.  He  was 
in  evening  clothes,  and  crystal  and  silver  glittered  on 
his  board.  But  his  gray  eyes  were  h alf -closed ;  and  the 
gleam  from  his  plate  could  not  pass  the  long,  dark  lashes. 
For  his  spirit  was  far  distant  too,  on  the  jungle  traite 
with  that  of  Little  Shikara, 


II 

One  sunlit  morning,  perhaps  a  month  after  the  skin  of 
Nahar  was  brought  in  from  the  jungle,  Warwick  Sahib's 
mail  was  late.  It  was  an  unheard-of  thing.  Always  be- 
fore, just  as  the  clock  struck  eight,  he  would  hear  the  cheer- 
ful tinkle  of  the  postman's  bells.     At  first  he  considered 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara        9 

complaining;  but  as  morning  drew  to  early  afternoon,  he 
began  to  believe  that  investigation  would  be  the  wiser  course. 

The  postman's  route  carried  him  along  an  old  elephant 
trail  through  a  patch  of  thick  jungle  beside  one  of  the 
tributaries  of  the  Manipur.  When  natives  went  out  to 
look,  he  was  neither  on  the  path  nor  drowned  in  the  creek, 
nor  yet  in  his  thatched  hut  at  the  other  end  of  his  route.  The 
truth  was  that  this  particular  postman's  bells  would  never 
be  heard  by  human  ears  again.  And  there  was  enough 
evidence  in  the  wet  mold  of  the  trail  to  know  what  had 
occurred. 

That  night  the  circle  under  the  tree  was  silent  and 
shivering.  "Who  is  next?"  they  asked  of  one  another. 
The  jungle  night  came  down,  breathless  and  mysterious,  and 
now  and  then  a  twig  was  cracked  by  a  heavy  foot  at 
the  edge  of  the  thickets.  In  Warwick's  house,  the  great 
Protector  oi  the  Poor  took  his  rifles  from  their  cases  and 
fitted  them  together. 

"To-morrow,"  he  told  Gunga  Singhai,  "we  will  settle 
for  that  postman's  death." 

Singhai  breathed  deeply  but  said  nothing.  Perhaps  his 
dark  eyes  brightened.  The  tiger  hunts  were  nearly  as 
great  a  delight  to  him  as  they  were  to  Warwick  himself. 

But  while  Nahara,  lame  from  Warwick's  bullet,  could 
no  longer  overtake  cattle,  she  did  with  great  skilfulness 
avoid  the  onrush  of  the  beaters.  Again  Little  Shikara 
waited  at  the  village  gate  for  his  hero  to  return;  but  the 
beaters  walked  silently  to-night.  Nor  were  there  any  tales 
to  be  told  under  the  tree. 

Nahara,  a  fairly  respectable  cattle  killer  before,  had  be- 
come in  a  single  night  one  of  the  worst  terrors  of  India. 
Of  course  she  was  still   a  coward,  but  she  had  learned, 


10      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

by  virtue  of  a  chance  meeting  with  a  postman  on  a  trail 
after  a  week  of  heart-devouring  starvation,  two  or  three 
extremely  portentous  lessons.  One  of  them  was  that  not 
even  the  little  deer,  drinking  beside  the  Manipur,  died 
half  so  easily  as  these  tall,  forked  forms  of  which  she  had 
previously  been  so  afraid.  She  found  out  also  that  they 
could  neither  run  swiftly  nor  walk  silently,  and  they  could 
be  approached  easily  even  by  a  tiger  that  cracked  a  twig 
with  every  step.  It  simplified  the  problem  of  living  im- 
mensely; and  just  as  any  other  feline  would  have  done, 
she  took  the  line  of  least  resistance.  If  there  had  been 
plenty  of  carrion  in  the  jungle,  Nahara  might  never  have 
hunted  men.  But  the  kites  and  the  jackals  looked  after 
the  carrion;  and  they  were  much  swifter  and  keener-eyed 
than  a  lame  tiger. 

She  knew  enough  not  to  confine  herself  to  one  village; 
and  it  is  rather  hard  to  explain  how  any  lower  creature, 
that  obviously  can  not  reason,  could  have  possessed  this 
knowledge.  Perhaps  it  was  because  she  had  learned  that 
a  determined  hunt,  with  many  beaters  and  men  on  ele- 
phants, invariably  followed  her  killings.  It  was  always 
well  to  travel  just  as  far  as  possible  from  the  scene.  She 
found  out  also  that,  just  as  a  doe  is  easier  felled  than  a 
horned  buck,  certain  of  this  new  kind  of  game  were  more 
easily  taken  than  the  others.  Sometimes  children  played 
at  the  door  of  their  huts,  and  sometimes  old  men  were 
afflicted  with  such  maladies  that  they  could  not  flee  at  all. 
All  these  things  Nahara  learned;  and  in  learning  them  she 
caused  a  certain  civil  office  of  the  British  Empire  to  put 
an  exceedingly  large  price  on  her  head. 

Gradually  the  fact  dawned  on  her  that,  unlike  the  deer 
and   the  buffalo,   this  new   game  was  more  easily  hunted 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara       n 

in  the  daylight,  particularly  in  that  tired-out,  careless  twi- 
light hour  when  the  herders  and  the  plantation  hands  came 
in  from  their  work.  At  night  the  village  folk  kept  in  their 
huts,  and  such  wood-cutters  and  gipsies  as  slept  without 
wakened  every  hour  to  tend  their  fires.  Nahara  was  deathly 
afraid  of  fire.  Night  after  night  she  would  creep  round 
and  round  a  gipsy  camp,  her  eyes  like  two  pale  blue  moons 
in  the  darkness,  and  would  never  dare  attack. 

And  because  she  was  taking  her  living  in  a  manner  for- 
bidden by  the  laws  of  the  jungle,  the  glory  and  beauty 
of  her  youth  quickly  departed  from  her.  There  are  no 
prisons  for  those  that  break  the  jungle  laws,  no  courts 
and  no  appointed  officers;  but  because  these  are  laws  that 
go  down  to  the  roots  of  life,  punishment  is  always  swift 
and  inevitable.  "Thou  shalt  not  kill  men,"  is  the  first 
law  of  the  wild  creatures;  and  every  one  knows  that  any 
animal  or  breed  of  animals  that  breaks  this  law  has  sooner 
or  later  been  hunted  down  and  slain,  just  like  any  other 
murderer.  The  mange  came  upon  her,  and  she  lost  flesh, 
and  certain  of  her  teeth  began  to  come  out.  She  was  no 
longer  the  beautiful  female  of  her  species,  to  be  sung  to 
by  the  weaver-birds  as  she  passed  beneath.  She  was  a 
hag  and  a  vampire,  hatred  of  whom  lay  deep  in  every 
human  heart  in  her  hunting  range. 

Often  the  hunting  was  poor,  and  sometimes  she  went 
many  days  in  a  stretch  without  making  a  single  kill.  And 
in  all  beasts,  high  and  low,  this  is  the  last  step  to  the 
worst  degeneracy  of  all.  It  instills  a  curious,  terrible  kind 
of  blood-lust — to  kill,  not  once,  but  as  many  times  as  pos- 
sible in  the  same  hunt;  to  be  content  not  with  one  death, 
but  to  slay  and  slay  until  the  whole  herd  is  destroyed. 
It   is  the  instinct  that  makes  a  little  weasel   kill  all  the 


12      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

chickens  in  a  coop,  when  one  was  all  it  could  possibly 
carry  away,  and  that  will  cause  a  wolf  to  leap  from  sheep 
to  sheep  in  a  fold  until  every  one  is  dead.  Nahara  didn't 
get  a  chance  to  kill  every  day;  so  when  the  opportunity  did 
come,  like  a  certain  pitiable  kind  of  human  hunter  who 
comes  from  afar  to  hunt  small  game,  she  killed  as  many 
times  as  she  could  in  quick  succession.  And  the  British 
Empire  raised  the  price  on  her  head. 

One  afternoon  found  her  within  a  half-mile  of  War- 
wick's bungalow,  and  for  five  days  she  had  gone  without 
food.  One  would  not  have  thought  of  her  as  a  royal  tigress, 
the  queen  of  the  felines  and  one  of  the  most  beautiful  of 
all  living  things.  And  since  she  was  still  tawny  and  grace- 
ful, it  would  be  hard  to  understand  why  she  no  longer 
gave  the  impression  of  beauty.  It  was  simply  gone,  as  a 
flame  goes,  and  her  queenliness  was  wholly  departed  too. 
In  some  vague  way  she  had  become  a  poisonous,  a  ghastly 
thing,  to  be  named  with  such  outcasts  as  the  jackals  or 
hyenas. 

Excessive  hungeT,  in  most  of  the  flesh-eating  animals,  is 
really  a  first  cousin  to  madness.  It  brings  bad  dreams 
and  visions,  and,  worst  of  all,  it  induces  an  insubordina- 
tion to  all  the  forest  laws  of  man  and  beast.  A  well-fed 
wolf  pack  will  run  in  stark  panic  from  a  human  being; 
but  even  the  wisest  of  mountaineers  do  not  care  to  meet 
the  same  gray  band  in  the  starving  times  of  winter.  Starva- 
tion brings  recklessness,  a  desperate  frenzied  courage  that 
is  likely  to  upset  all  of  one's  preconceived  notions  as  to  the 
behavior  of  animals.  It  also  brings,  so  that  all  men  may 
be  aware  of  its  presence,  a  peculiar  lurid  glow  to  the  balls 
of  the  eyes. 

In  fact,  the  two  pale  circles  of  fire  were  the  most  notice- 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara       13 

able  characteristics  of  the  long,  tawny  cat  that  crept  through 
the  bamboos.  Except  for  them,  she  would  hardly  have  been 
discernible  at  all.  The  yellow  grass  made  a  perfect  back- 
ground, her  black  stripes  looked  like  the  streaks  of  shadow 
between  the  stalks  of  bamboo,  and  for  one  that  is  lame  she 
crept  with  an  astounding  silence.  One  couldn't  have  be- 
lieved that  such  a  great  creature  could  lie  so  close  to  the 
earth  and  be  so  utterly  invisible  in  the  low  thickets. 

A  little  peninsula  of  dwarf  bamboos  and  tall  jungle  grass 
extended  out  into  the  pasture  before  the  village  and  Nahara 
crept  out  clear  to  its  point.  She  didn't  seem  to  be  moving. 
One  couldn't  catch  the  stir  and  draw  of  muscles.  And 
yet  she  slowly  glided  to  the  end;  then  began  her  wait:  Her 
head  sunk  low,  her  body  grew  tense,  her  tail  whipped  softly 
back  and  forth,  with  as  easy  a  motion  as  the  swaying  of 
a  serpent.  The  light  flamed  and  died  and  flamed  and  died 
again  in  her  pale  eyes. 

Soon  a  villager,  who  had  been  working  in  Warwick's 
fields,  came  trotting  in  Oriental  fashion  across  the  meadow. 
His  eyes  were  only  human,  and  he  did  not  see  the  tawny 
shape  in  the  tall  grass.  If  any  one  had  told  him  that  a 
full-grown  tigress  could  have  crept  to  such  a  place  and 
still  remained  invisible,  he  would  have  laughed.  He  was 
going  to  his  thatch  hut,  to  brown  wife  and  babies,  and  it 
was  no  wonder  that  he  trotted  swiftly.  The  muscles  of 
the  great  cat  bunched,  and  now  the  whipping  tail  began 
to  have  a  little  vertical  motion  that  is  the  final  warning 
of  a  spring. 

The  man  was  already  in  leaping  range;  but  the  tiger 
had  learned,  in  many  experiences,  always  to  make  sure.  Still 
she  crouched,  a  single  instant  in  which  the  trotting  native 


14      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

came  two  paces  nearer.  Then  the  man  drew  up  with  a 
gasp  of  fright. 

For  just  as  the  clear  outlines  of  an  object  that  has  long 
been  concealed  in  a  maze  of  light  and  shadow  will  often 
leap,  with  sudden  vividness,  to  the  eyes,  the  native  suddenly 
perceived  the  tiger. 

He  caught  the  whole  dread  picture:  the  crouching  form, 
the  terrible  blue  lights  of  the  eyes,  the  whipping  tail.  The 
gasp  he  uttered  from  his  closing  throat  seemed  to  act  like 
the  fall  of  a  firing-pin  against  a  shell  on  the  bunched 
muscles  of  the  animal;  and  she  left  her  covert  in  a  streak 
of  tawny  light. 

But  Nahara's  leaps  had  never  been  quite  accurate  since 
she  had  been  wounded  by  Warwick's  bullet,  months  before. 
They  were  usually  straight  enough  for  the  general  pur- 
poses of  hunting,  but  they  missed  by  a  long  way  the 
"theoretical  center  of  impact"  of  which  artillery  officers 
speak.  Her  lame  paw  always  seems  to  disturb  her  balance. 
By  remembering  it,  she  could  usually  partly  overcome  the 
disadvantage;  but  to-day,  in  the  madness  of  her  hunger, 
she  had  been  unable  to  remember  anything  except  the  ter- 
rible rapture  of  killing.  This  circumstance  alone,  however, 
would  not  have  saved  the  native's  life.  Even  though  her 
fangs  missed  his  throat,  the  power  of  the  blow  and  her 
rending  talons  would  have  certainly  snatched  away  his  life 
as  a  storm  snatches  a  leaf.  But  there  was  one  other  de- 
termining factor.  The  Burman  had  seen  the  tiger  just 
before  she  leaped;  and  although  there  had  been  no  time 
for  conscious  thought,  his  guardian  reflexes  had  flung  him 
to  one  side  in  a  single  frenzied  effort  to  miss  the  full  force 
of  the  spring. 

The  result  of  both   these   things  was  that   he   received 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara       15 

only  an  awkward,  sprawling  blow  from  the  animal's  shoul- 
der. Of  course  he  was  hurled  to  the  ground ;  for  no  human 
body  in  the  world  is  built  to  withstand  the  ton  or  so  of 
shocking  power  of  a  three-hundred-pound  cat  leaping  through 
the  air.  The  tigress  sprawled  down  also,  and  because  she 
lighted  on  her  wounded  paw,  she  squealed  with  pain.  It 
was  possibly  three  seconds  before  she  had  forgotten  the 
stabbing  pain  in  her  paw  and  had  gathered  herself  to  spring 
on  the  unconscious  form  of  the  native.  And  that  three 
seconds  gave  Warwick  Sahib,  sitting  at  the  window  of  his 
study,  an  opportunity  to  seize  his  rifle  and  fire. 

Warwick  knew  tigers,  and  he  had  kept  the  rifle  always 
Teady  for  just  such  a  need  as  this.  The  distance  was  nearly 
five  hundred  yards,  and  the  bullet  went  wide  of  its  mark. 
Nevertheless,  it  saved  the  native's  life.  The  great  cat 
remembered  this  same  far-off  explosion  from  another  day,  in 
a  dry  creek-bed  of  months  before,  and  the  sing  of  the  bullet 
was  a  remembered  thing  too.  Although  it  would  speedily 
return  to  her,  her  courage  fled,  and  she  turned  and  raced 
into  the  bamboos. 

In  an  instant,  Warwick  was  on  his  great  veranda,  call- 
ing his  beaters.  Gunga  Singhai,  his  faithful  gun  carrier, 
slipped  shells  into  the  magazine  of  his  master's  high-calibered 
close-range  tiger  rifle.  "The  elephant,  Sahib?"  he  asked 
swiftly. 

"Nay,  this  will  be  on  foot.  Make  the  beaters  circle  about 
the  fringe  of  bamboos.  Thou  and  I  will  cross  the  eastern 
fields  and  shoot  at  her  as  she  breaks  through." 

But  there  was  really  no  time  to  plan  a  complete  cam- 
paign. Even  now,  the  first  gray  of  twilight  was  blurring 
the  sharp  outlines  of  the  jungle,  and  the  soft  jungle  night 
was  hovering,  ready  to  descend.     Warwick's  plan  was  to 


16      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

cut  through  to  a  certain  little  creek  that  flowed  into  the 
river  and  with  Singhai  to  continue  on  to  the  edge  of  the 
bamboos  that  overlooked  a  wide  field.  The  beaters  would 
prevent  the  tigress  from  turning  back  beyond  the  village, 
and  it  was  at  least  possible  that  he  would  get  a  shot 
at  her  as  she  burst  from  the  jungle  and  crossed  the  field 
to  the  heavier  thickets  beyond. 

"Warwick  Sahib  walks  into  the  teeth  of  his  enemy," 
Khusru,  the  hunter,  told  a  little  group  that  watched  from 
the  village  gate.     "Nahara  will  collect  her  debts." 

A  little  brown  boy  shivered  at  his  words  and  wondered 
if  the  beaters  would  turn  and  kick  him,  as  they  had  always 
done  before,  if  he  should  attempt  to  follow  them.  It  was 
the  tiger  hunt,  in  view  of  his  own  village,  and  he  sat  down 
tremulous  with  rapture  in  the  grass  to  watch.  It  was  almost 
as  if  his  dream — that  he  himself  should  be  a  hunter  of  tigers 
— was  coming  true.  He  wondered  why  the  beaters  seemed 
to  move  so  slowly  and  with  so  little  heart. 

He  would  have  known  if  he  could  have  looked  into  their 
eyes.  Each  black  pupil  was  framed  with  white.  Human 
hearts  grow  shaken  and  bloodless  from  such  sights  as  this 
they  had  just  seen,  and  only  the  heart  of  a  jungle  creature — 
the  heart  of  the  eagle  that  the  jungle  gods,  by  some  unheard- 
of  fortune,  had  put  in  the  breast  of  Little  Shikara — could 
prevail  against  them.  Besides,  the  superstitious  Burmans 
thought  that  Warwick  was  walking  straight  to  his  death, 
that  the  time  had  come  for  Nahara  to  collect  her  debts. 


Ill 

Warwick   Sahib   and    Singhai   disappeared   at   once   into 
the  fringe  of  jungle,  and  silence  immediately  fell  upon  them. 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara       17 

The  cries  of  the  beaters  at  once  seemed  curiously  dim.  It 
was  as  if  no  sound  could  live  in  the  great  silences  under 
the  arching  trees.     Soon  it  was  as  if  they  were  alone. 

They  walked  side  by  side,  Warwick  with  his  rifle  held 
ready.  He  had  no  false  ideas  in  regard  to  this  tiger  hunt. 
He  knew  that  his  prey  was  desperate  with  hunger,  that  she 
had  many  old  debts  to  pay,  and  that  she  would  charge 
on  sight. 

The  self-rage  that  is  felt  on  missing  some  particularly 
fortunate  chance  is  not  confined  to  human  beings  alone. 
There  is  an  old  saying  in  the  forest  that  a  feline  that  has 
missed  his  stroke  is  like  a  jackal  in  dog  days,  and  that 
means  that  it  is  not  safe  to  be  anywhere  in  the  region 
with  him.  He  simply  goes  rabid  and  is  quite  likely  to 
leap  at  the  first  living  thing  that  stirs.  Warwick  knew 
that  Nahara  had  just  been  cheated  out  of  her  kill  and  some 
one  in  the  jungle  would  pay  for  it. 

The  gaudy  birds  that  looked  down  from  the  tree  branches 
could  scarcely  recognize  this  prematurely  gray  man  as  a 
hunter.  He  walked  rather  quietly,  yet  with  no  conscious 
effort  toward  stealth.  The  rifle  rested  easily  in  his  arms, 
his  gray  eyes  were  quiet  and  thoughtful  as  always.  Singu- 
larly, his  splendid  features  were  quite  in  repose.  The 
Burman,  however,  had  more  of  the  outer  signs  of  alert- 
ness; and  yet  there  was  none  of  the  blind  terror  upon  him 
that  marked  the  beaters. 

'Where  are  the  men?"  Warwick  asked  quietly.  "It  is 
strange  that  we  do  not  hear  them  shouting.'* 

"They  are  afraid,  Sahib,"  Singhai  replied.  "The  forest 
pigs  have  left  us  to  do  our  own  hunting." 

Warwick  corrected  him  with  a  smile.     "Forest  pigs  are 


18      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

brave  enough,"  he  answered.  "They  are  sheep — just  sheep 
— sheep  of  the  plains." 

The  broad  trail  divided,  like  a  three-tined  candlestick, 
into  narrow  trails.  Warwick  halted  beside  the  center  of  the 
three  that  led  to  the  creek  they  were  obliged  to  cross.  Just 
for  an  instant  he  stood  watching,  gazing  into  the  deep-blue 
dusk  of  the  deeper  jungle.  Twilight  was  falling  softly. 
The  trails  soon  vanished  into  shadow,  patches  of  deep 
gloom,  relieved  here  and  there  by  a  bright  leaf  that  reflected 
the  last  twilight  rays.  A  living  creature  coughed  and 
rustled  away  in  the  thickets  beside  him. 

"There  is  little  use  of  going  on,"  he  said.  "It  is  grow- 
ing too  dark.  But  there  will  be  killings  before  the  dawn 
if  we  don't  get  her  first." 

The  servant  stood  still,  waiting.  It  was  not  his  place 
to  advise  his  master. 

"If  we  leave  her,  she'll  come  again  before  the  dawn. 
Many  of  the  herders  haven't  returned — she'll  get  one  of 
them  sure.  At  least  we  may  cross  the  creek  and  get  a 
view  of  the  great  fields.  She  is  certain  to  cross  them  if 
she  has  heard  the  beaters." 

In  utter  silence  they  went  on.  One  hundred  yards  far- 
ther they  came  to  the  creek,  and  both  strode  in  together 
to  ford. 

The  water  was  only  knee-deep,  but  Warwick's  boots 
sank  three  inches  in  the  mud  of  the  bottom.  And  at  that 
instant  the  gods  of  the  jungle,  always  waiting  with  drawn 
scimitar  for  the  unsuspecting,  turned  against  them. 

Singhai  suddenly  splashed  down  into  the  water,  on  his 
hands  and  knees.  He  did  not  cry  out.  If  he  made  any 
sound  at  all,  it  was  just  a  shivering  gasp  that  the  splash 
of  water  wholly  obscured.    But  the  thing  that  brought  home 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara      19 

the  truth  to  Warwick  was  the  pain  that  flashed,  vivid 
as  lightning,  across  his  dark  face;  and  the  horror  of  death 
that  left  its  shadow.  Something  churned  and  writhed  in 
the  mud;  and  then  Warwick  fired. 

Both  of  them  had  forgotten  Mugger,  the  crocodile,  that 
so  loves  to  wait  in  the  mud  of  a  ford.  He  had  seized 
Singhai's  foot,  and  had  already  snatched  him  down  into 
the  water  when  Warwick  fired.  No  living  flesh  can  with- 
stand the  terrible,  rending  shock  of  a  high-powered  sporting 
rifle  at  close  range.  Mugger  had  plates  of  armor,  but  even 
these  could  not  have  availed  against  it  if  he  had  been  ex- 
posed to  the  fire.  As  it  was,  several  inches  of  water  stood 
between,  a  more  effective  armor  than  a  two-inch  steel  plate 
on  a  battleship.  Of  course  the  shock  carried  through,  a 
smashing  blow  that  caused  the  reptile  to  release  his  hold 
on  Singhai's  leg;  but  before  the  native  could  get  to  his 
feet  he  had  struck  again.  The  next  instant  both  men  were 
fighting  for  their  lives. 

They  fought  with  their  hands,  and  Warwick  fought 
with  his  rifle,  and  the  native  slashed  again  and  again  with 
the  long  knife  that  he  carried  at  his  belt.  To  a  casual 
glance,  a  crocodile  is  wholly  incapable  of  quick  action. 
These  two  found  him  a  slashing,  darting,  wolf-like 
thing,  lunging  with  astounding  speed  through  the  muddied 
water,  knocking  them  from  their  feet  and  striking  at  them 
as  they  fell. 

The  reptile  was  only  half-grown,  but  in  the  water  they 
had  none  of  the  usual  advantages  that  man  has  over  the 
beasts  with  which  he  does  battle.  Warwick  could  not  find 
a  target  for  his  rifle.  But  even  human  bodies,  usually  so 
weak,  find  themselves  possessed  of  an  amazing  reserve 
strength  and  agility  in  the  moment  of  need.     These  men 


20      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

realized  perfectly  that  their  lives  were  the  stakes  for  which 
they  fought,  and  they  gave  every  ounce  of  strength  and 
energy  they  had.  Their  aim  was  to  hold  the  mugger  off 
until  they  could  reach  the  shore. 

At  last,  by  a  lucky  stroke,  Singhai's  knife  blinded  one 
of  the  lurid,  reptile  eyes.  He  was  prone  in  the  water  when 
he  administered  it,  and  it  went  home  just  as  the  savage 
teeth  were  snapping  at  his  throat.  For  an  instant  the  great 
reptile  flopped  in  an  impotent  half-circle,  partly  reared 
out  of  the  water.  It  gave  Warwick  a  chance  to  shoot,  a 
single  instant  in  which  the  rifle  seemed  to  whirl  about 
in  his  arms,  drive  to  his  shoulder,  and  blaze  in  the  deepen- 
ing twilight.  And  the  shot  went  true.  It  pierced  the 
mugger  from  beneath,  tearing  upward  through  the  brain. 
And  then  the  agitated  waters  of  the  ford  slowly  grew 
quiet. 

The  last  echo  of  the  report  was  dying  when  Singhai 
stretched  his  bleeding  arms  about  Warwick's  body,  caught 
up  the  rifle  and  dragged  them  forty  feet  up  on  the  shore. 
It  was  an  effort  that  cost  the  last  of  his  strength.  And 
as  the  stars  popped  out  of  the  sky,  one  by  one,  through  the 
gray  of  dusk  the  two  men  lay  silent,  side  by  side,  on  the 
grassy  bank. 

Warwick  was  the  first  to  regain  consciousness.  At  first 
he  didn't  understand  the  lashing  pain  in  his  wrists,  the 
strange  numbness  in  one  of  his  legs,  the  darkness  with  the 
great  white  Indian  stars  shining  through.  Then  he  re- 
membered. And  he  tried  to  stretch  his  arm  to  the  prone 
form  beside  him. 

The  attempt  was  an  absolute  failure.  The  cool  brain 
dispatched  the  message;  it  flew  along  the  telegraph  wires 
of  the  nerves,  but  the  muscles  refused   to  react.     He  re- 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara      21 

membered  that  the  teeth  of  the  mugger  had  met  in  one 
of  the  muscles  of  his  upper  arm,  but  before  unconsciousness 
had  come  upon  him  he  had  been  able  to  lift  the  gun  to 
shoot.  Possibly  infection  from  the  bite  had  in  some  manner 
temporarily  paralyzed  the  arm.  He  turned,  wracked  with 
pain,  on  his  side  and  lifted  his  left  arm.  In  doing  so  his 
hand  crossed  before  his  eyes — and  then  he  smiled  wanly  in 
the  darkness. 

It  was  quite  like  Warwick,  sportsman  and  English  gentle- 
man, to  smile  at  a  time  like  this.  Even  in  the  gray  dark- 
ness of  the  jungle  night  he  could  see  the  hand  quite  plainly. 
It  no  longer  looked  slim  and  white.  And  he  remembered 
that  the  mugger  had  caught  his  fingers  in  one  of  its  last 
rushes. 

He  paused  only  for  one  glance  at  the  mutilated  member. 
He  knew  that  his  first  work  was  to  see  how  Singhai  had 
fared.  In  that  glance  he  was  boundlessly  relieved  to  see 
that  the  hand  could  unquestionably  be  saved.  The  fingers 
were  torn,  yet  their  bones  did  not  seem  to  be  severed.  Tem- 
porarily at  least,  however,  the  hand  was  utterly  useless. 
The  fingers  felt  strange  and  detached. 

He  reached  out  to  the  still  form  beside  him,  touching 
the  dark  skin  first  with  his  fingers,  and  then,  because  they 
had  ceased  to  function,  with  the  flesh  of  his  wrist.  He  ex- 
pected to  find  it  cold.  Singhai  was  alive,  however,  and 
his  warm  blood  beat  close  to  the  dark  skin. 

But  he  was  deeply  unconscious,  and  it  was  possible  that 
one  foot  was  hopelessly  mutilated. 

For  a  moment  Warwick  lay  quite  still,  looking  his  situa- 
tion squarely  in  the  face.  He  did  not  believe  that  either 
he  or  his  attendant  was  mortally  or  even  very  seriously 
hurt.     True,  one  of  his  arms  had  suffered  paralysis,  but 


22       The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

there  was  no  reason  for  thinking  it  had  been  permanently 
injured.  His  hand  would  be  badly  scarred,  but  soon 
as  good  as  ever.  The  real  question  that  faced  them  was  that 
of  getting  back  to  the  bungalow. 

Walking  was  out  of  the  question.  His  whole  body  was 
bruised  and  lacerated,  and  he  was  already  dangerously  weak 
from  loss  of  blood.  It  would  take  all  his  energy,  these 
first  few  hours,  to  keep  his  consciousness.  Besides,  it  was 
perfectly  obvious  that  Singhai  could  not  walk.  And  English 
gentlemen  do  not  desert  their  servants  at  a  time  like  this. 
The  real  mystery  lay  in  the  fact  that  the  beaters  had  not 
already  found  and  rescued  them. 

He  wore  a  watch  with  luminous  dial  on  his  left  wrist, 
and  he  managed  to  get  it  before  his  eyes.  And  then  under- 
standing came  to  him.  A  full  hour  had  passed  since  he 
and  his  servant  had  fought  the  mugger  in  the  ford.  And 
the  utter  silence  of  early  night  had  come  down  over  the 
jungle. 

There  was  only  one  thing  to  believe.  The  beaters  had 
evidently  heard  him  shoot,  sought  in  vain  for  him  in  the 
thickets,  possibly  passed  within  a  few  hundred  feet  of  him, 
and  because  he  had  been  unconscious,  he  had  not  heard 
them  or  called  to  them,  and  now  they  had  given  him  up 
for  lost.  He  remembered  with  bitterness  how  all  of  them 
had  been  sure  that  an  encounter  with  Nahara  would  cost 
him  his  life,  and  would  thus  be  all  the  more  quick  to  be- 
lieve he  had  died  in  her  talons.  Nahara  had  her  mate 
and  her  own  lameness  to  avenge,  they  had  said,  attributing  in 
their  superstition  human  emotions  to  the  brute  natures  of 
animals.  It  would  have  been  quite  useless  for  Warwick 
to  attempt  to  tell  them  that  the  male  tiger,  in  the  mind 
of  her  wicked  mate,  was  no  longer  even  a  memory,  and 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara      23 

that  premeditated  vengeance  is  an  emotion  almost  unknown 
in  the  animal  world.  Without  leaders  or  encouragement, 
and  terribly  frightened  by  the  scene  they  had  beheld  be- 
fore the  village,  they  had  quickly  given  up  any  attempt  to 
find  her  body.  There  had  been  none  among  them  cool- 
headed  enough  to  reason  out  which  trail  he  had  likely  taken, 
and  thus  look  for  him  by  the  ford.  Likely  they  were 
already  huddled  in  their  thatch  huts,  waiting  till  daylight. 

Then  he  called  into  the  darkness.  A  heavy  body  brushed 
through  the  creepers,  and  stepping  falsely,  broke  a  twig. 
He  thought  at  first  that  it  might  be  one  of  the  villagers, 
coming  to  look  for  him.    But  at  once  the  step  was  silenced. 

Warwick  had  a  disturbing  thought  that  the  creature 
that  had  broken  the  twig  had  not  gone  away,  but  was  crouch- 
ing down,  in  a  curious  manner,  in  the  deep  shadows.  Nahara 
had  returned  to  her  hunting. 

IV 

"Some  time  I  too  will  be  a  hunter  of  tigers,"  Little  Shi- 
kara told  his  mother  when  the  beaters  began  to  circle 
through  the  bamboos.  "To  carry  a  gun  beside  Warwick 
Sahib — and  to  be  honored  in  the  circle  under  the  tree!" 

But  his  mother  hardly  listened.  She  was  quivering  with 
fright.  She  had  seen  the  last  part  of  the  drama  in  front 
of  the  village;  and  she  was  too  frightened  even  to  notice 
the  curious  imperturbability  of  her  little  son.  But  there 
was  no  orderly  retreat  after  Little  Shikara  had  heard 
the  two  reports  of  the  rifle.  At  first  there  were  only 
the  shouts  of  the  beaters,  singularly  high-pitched,  much 
running  back  and  forth  in  the  shadows,  and  then  a  pell- 
mell  scurry  to  the  shelter  of  the  villages. 


24      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

For  a  few  minutes  there  was  wild  excitement  at  the 
village  gates.  Warwick  Sahib  was  dead,  they  said;  they 
had  heard  the  shots  and  run  to  the  place  of  firing,  and 
beat  up  and  down  through  the  bamboos;  and  Warwick 
Sahib  had  surely  been  killed  and  carried  off  by  the  tigress. 
This  dreadful  story  told,  most  of  the  villagers  went  to  hide 
at  once  in  their  huts;  only  a  little  circle  of  the  bravest 
men  hovered  at  the  gate.  They  watched  with  drawn  faces 
the  growing  darkness. 

But  there  was  one  among  them  who  was  not  yet  a  man- 
grown;  a  boy  so  small  that  he  could  hover,  unnoticed,  in 
the  very  smallest  of  the  terrible  shadow-patches.  He  was 
Little  Shikara,  and  he  was  shocked  to  the  very  depths  of 
his  worshiping  heart.  For  Warwick  had  been  his  hero,  the 
greatest  man  of  all  time,  and  he  felt  himself  burning  with 
indignation  that  the  beaters  should  return  so  soon.  And 
it  was  a  curious  fact  that  he  had  not  as  yet  been  infected 
with  the  contagion  of  terror  that  was  being  passed  from 
man  to  man  among  the  villagers.  Perhaps  his  indignation 
was  too  absorbing  an  emotion  to  leave  room  for  terror,  and 
perhaps,  far  down  in  his  childish  spirit,  he  was  made  of 
different  stuff.  He  was  a  child  of  the  jungle,  and  perhaps 
he  had  shared  of  that  great  imperturbability  and  impassive- 
ness  that  is  the  eternal  trait  of  the  wilderness. 

He  went  up  to  one  of  the  younger  beaters  who  had  told 
and  retold  the  story  of  catching  a  glimpse  of  Nahara  in 
the  thickets  until  no  one  was  left  to  tell  it  to.  He  was 
standing  silent,  and  Little  Shikara  thought  it  possible  that 
he  might  reach  his  ears. 

"Give  ear,  Puran,"  he  pleaded.  "Didst  thou  look  for 
his  body  beside  the  ford  over  Tarai  stream?" 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara      25 

"Nay,  little  one — though  I  passed  within  one  hundred 
paces." 

"Dost  thou  not  know  that  he  and  Singhai  would  of  a 
certainty  cross  at  the  ford  to  reach  the  fringe  of  jungle 
from  which  he  might  watch  the  Eastern  field?  Some  of 
you  looked  on  the  trail  beside  the  ford,  but  none  looked 
at  the  ford  itself.  And  the  sound  of  the  rifle  seemed  to 
come  from  thence." 

"But  why  did  he  not  call  out?" 

"Dead  men  could  not  call,  but  at  least  ye  might  have 
frightened  Nahara  from  the  body.  But  perhaps  he  is 
wounded,  unable  to  speak,  and  lies  there  still " 

But  Puran  had  found  another  listener  for  his  story,  and 
speedily  forgot  the  boy.  He  hurried  over  to  another  of  the 
villagers,  Khusru  the  hunter. 

"Did  no  one  look  by  the  ford?"  he  asked,  almost  sobbing. 
"For  that  is  the  place  he  had  gone." 

The  native's  eyes  seemed  to  light.  "Hai,  little  one,  thou 
hast  thought  of  what  thy  elders  had  forgotten.  There  is 
level  land  there,  and  clear.  And  I  shall  go  at  the  first  ray 
of  dawn " 

"But  not  to-night,  Khusru ?" 

"Nay,  little  sinner!  Wouldst  thou  have  me  torn  to 
pieces?" 

Lastly  Little  Shikara  went  to  his  own  father,  and  they 
had  a  moment's  talk  at  the  outskirts  of  the  throng.  But 
the  answer  was  nay — just  the  same.  Even  his  brave  father 
would  not  go  to  look  for  the  body  until  daylight  came. 
The  boy  felt  his  skin  prickling  all  over. 

"But  perhaps  he  is  only  wounded — and  left  to  die.  If 
I  go  and  return  with  word  that  he  is  there,  wilt  thou  take 
others  and  go  out  and  bring  him  in?" 


26      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

"Thou  goest!"  his  father  broke  forth  in  a  great  roar  of 
laughter.  "Why,  thou  little  hawk!  One  would  think 
that  thou  wert  a  hunter  of  tigers  thyself!" 

Little  Shikara  blushed  beneath  the  laughter.  For  he 
was  a  very  boyish  little  boy  in  most  ways.  But  it  seemed 
to  him  that  his  sturdy  young  heart  was  about  to  break  open 
from  bitterness.  All  of  them  agreed  that  Warwick  Sahib, 
perhaps  wounded  and  dying,  might  be  lying  by  the  ford, 
but  none  of  them  would  venture  forth  to  see.  Unknowing, 
he  was  beholding  the  expression  of  a  certain  age-old  trait 
of  human  nature.  Men  do  not  fight  ably  in  the  dark. 
They  need  their  eyes,  and  they  particularly  require  a  definite 
object  to  give  them  determination.  If  these  villagers  knew 
for  certain  that  the  Protector  of  the  Poor  lay  wounded 
or  even  dead  beside  the  ford,  they  would  have  rallied 
bravely,  encouraged  one  another  with  words  and  oaths,  and 
gone  forth  to  rescue  him ;  but  they  wholly  lacked  the  courage 
to  venture  again  into  the  jungle  on  any  such  blind  quest 
as  Little  Shikara  suggested. 

But  the  boy's  father  should  not  have  laughed.  He  should 
have  remembered  the  few  past  occasions  when  his  straight 
little  son  had  gone  into  the  jungle  alone;  and  that  remem- 
brance should  have  silenced  him.  The  difficulty  lay  in  the 
fact  that  he  supposed  his  boy  and  he  were  of  the  same 
flesh,  and  that  Little  Shikara  shared  his  own  great  dread 
of  the  night-curtained  jungle.  In  this  he  was  very  badly 
mistaken.  Little  Shikara  had  an  inborn  understanding 
and  love  of  the  jungle;  and  except  for  such  material  dangers 
as  that  of  Nahara,  he  was  not  afraid  of  it  at  all.  He 
had  no  superstitions  in  regard  to  it.  Perhaps  he  was  too 
young.  But  the  main  thing  that  the  laugh  did  was  to  set 
off,  as  a  match  sets  off  powder,  a  whole  heartful  of  un- 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara       27 

exploded  indignation  in  Shikara's  breast.  These  villagers 
not  only  had  deserted  their  patron  and  protector,  but  also 
they  had  laughed  at  the  thought  of  rescue !  His  own  father 
had  laughed  at  him. 

Little  Shikara  silently  left  the  circle  of  villagers  and 
turned  into  the  darkness. 

At  once  the  jungle  silence  closed  round  him.  He  hadn't 
dreamed  that  the  noise  of  the  villagers  would  die  so  quickly. 
Although  he  could  still  see  the  flame  of  the  fire  at  the 
village  gate  behind  him,  it  was  almost  as  if  he  had  at 
once  dropped  off  into  another  world.  Great  flowers  poured 
perfume  down  upon  him,  and  at  seemingly  a  great  distance 
he  heard  the  faint  murmur  of  the  wind. 

At  first,  deep  down  in  his  heart,  he  had  really  not  in- 
tended to  go  all  the  way.  He  had  expected  to  steal  clear 
to  the  outer  edge  of  the  firelight;  and  then  stand  listen- 
ing to  the  darkness  for  such  impressions  as  the  jungle 
would  choose  to  give  him.  But  there  had  been  no  threshold, 
no  interlude  of  preparation.  The  jungle  in  all  its  mystery 
had  folded  about  him  at  once. 

He  trotted  softly  down  the  elephant  trail,  a  dim,  fleet 
shadow  that  even  the  keen  eyes  of  Nahara  could  scarcely 
have  seen.  At  first  he  was  too  happy  to  be  afraid.  He 
was  always  happy  when  the  jungle  closed  round  him.  Be- 
sides, if  Nahara  had  killed,  she  would  be  full-fed  by  now 
and  not  to  be  feared.  Little  Shikara  hastened  on,  trembling 
all  over  with  a  joyous  sort  of  excitement. 

If  a  single  bird  had  flapped  its  wings  in  the  branches, 
if  one  little  rodent  had  stirred  in  the  underbrush,  Little 
Shikara  would  likely  have  turned  back.  But  the  jungle 
gods,  knowing  their  son,  stilled  all  the  forest  voices.  He 
crept  on,  still  looking  now  and  again  over  his  shoulder  to 


28       The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

see  the  village  fire.  It  still  made  a  bright  yellow  tri- 
angle in  the  dusk  behind  him.  He  didn't  stop  to  think 
that  he  was  doing  a  thing  most  grown  natives  and  many 
white  men  would  not  have  dared  to  do, — following  a  jungle 
trail  unarmed  at  night.  If  he  had  stopped  to  think  at 
all,  he  simply  would  have  been  unable  to  go  on.  He  was 
only  following  his  instincts,  voices  that  such  forces  as 
maturity  and  grown-up  intelligence  and  self-consciousness 
obscure  in  older  men,  and  the  terror  of  the  jungle  could 
not  touch  him.  He  went  straight  to  do  what  service  he 
could  for  the  white  sahib  that  was  one  of  his  lesser  gods. 

Time  after  time  he  halted,  but  always  he  pushed  on  a 
few  more  feet.  Now  he  was  over  half-way  to  the  ford,  clear 
to  the  forks  in  the  trail.  And  then  he  turned  about  with 
a  little  gasp  of  fear. 

The  light  from  the  village  had  gone  out.  The  thick 
foliage  of  the  jungle  had  come  between. 

He  was  really  frightened  now.  It  wasn't  that  he  was 
afraid  he  couldn't  get  back.  The  trail  was  broad  and 
hard  and  quite  gray  in  the  moonlight.  But  those  far-off 
beams  of  light  had  been  a  solace  to  his  spirit,  a  reminder 
that  he  had  not  yet  broken  all  ties  with  the  village.  He 
halted,  intending  to  turn  back. 

Then  a  thrill  began  at  his  scalp  and  went  clear  to  his 
bare  toes.  Faint  through  the  jungle  silences  he  heard 
Warwick  Sahib  calling  to  his  faithless  beaters.  The  voice 
had  an  unmistakable  quality  of  distress. 

Certain  of  the  villagers — a  very  few  of  them — said  after- 
ward that  Little  Shikara  continued  on  because  he  was 
afraid  to  go  back.  They  said  that  he  looked  upon  the 
Heaven-born  Sahib  as  a  source  of  all  power,  in  whose 
protection  no  harm  could  befall  him,  and  he  sped  toward 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara       29 

him  because  the  distance  was  shorter  than  back  to  the 
haven  of  fire  at  the  village.  But  those  who  could  look 
deeper  into  Little  Shikara's  soul  knew  different.  In  some 
degree  at  least  he  hastened  on  down  that  jungle  trail  of 
peril  because  he  knew  that  his  idol  was  in  distress,  and 
by  laws  that  went  deep  he  knew  he  must  go  to  his  aid. 


The  first  few  minutes  after  Warwick  had  heard  a  liv- 
ing step  in  the  thickets  he  spent  in  trying  to  reload  his 
rifle.  He  carried  other  cartridges  in  the  right-hand  trousers 
pocket,  but  after  a  few  minutes  of  futile  effort  it  became 
perfectly  evident  that  he  was  not  able  to  reach  them.  His 
right  arm  was  useless,  and  the  fingers  of  his  left,  lacerated 
by  the  mugger's  bite,  refused  to  take  hold. 

He  had,  however,  three  of  the  five  shells  the  rifle  held 
still  in  his  gun.  The  single  question  that  remained  was 
whether  or  not  they  would  be  of  use  to  him. 

The  rifle  lay  half  under  him,  its  stock  protruding  from 
beneath  his  body.  With  the  elbow  of  his  left  arm,  he  was 
able  to  work  it  out.  Considering  the  difficulties  under 
which  he  worked,  he  made  amazingly  few  false  motions; 
and  yet  he  worked  with  swiftness.  Warwick  was  a  man 
who  had  been  schooled  and  trained  by  many  dangers;  he 
had  learned  to  face  them  with  open  eyes  and  steady  hands, 
to  judge  with  unclouded  thought  the  exact  per  cent,  of 
his  chances.  He  knew  now  that  he  must  work  swiftly.  The 
shape  in  the  shadow  was  not  going  to  wait  all  night. 

But  at  that  moment  the  hope  of  preserving  his  life  that 
he  had  clung  to  until  now  broke  like  a  bubble  in  the  sun- 
light.    He  could  not  lift  the  gun  to  swing  and  aim  it  at 


30      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

a  shape  in  the  darkness.  With  his  mutilated  hands  he  could 
not  cock  the  strong-springed  hammer.  And  if  he  could 
do  both  these  things  with  his  fumbling,  bleeding,  lacerated 
fingers,  his  right  hand  could  not  be  made  to  pull  the  trigger. 
Warwick  Sahib  knew  at  last  just  where  he  stood.  Yet 
if  human  sight  could  have  penetrated  that  dusk,  it  would 
have  beheld  no  change  of  expression  in  the  lean  face. 

An  English  gentleman  lay  at  the  frontier  of  death.  But 
that  occasioned  neither  fawning  nor  a  loss  of  his  rigid  self- 
control. 

Two  things  remained,  however,  that  he  might  do.  One 
was  to  call  and  continue  to  call,  so  long  as  life  lasted  in 
his  body.  He  knew  perfectly  that  more  than  once  in  the 
history  of  India  a  tiger  had  been  kept  at  a  distance,  at 
least  for  a  short  period  of  time,  by  shouts  alone.  In  that 
interlude,  perhaps  help  might  come  from  the  village.  The 
second  thing  was  almost  as  impossible  as  raising  and  firing 
the  rifle;  but  by  the  luck  of  the  gods  he  might  achieve  it. 
He  wanted  to  find  Singhai's  knife  and  hold  it  compressed 
in  his  palm. 

It  wasn't  that  he  had  any  vain  hopes  of  repelling  the 
tiger's  attack  with  a  single  knife-blade  that  would  be  prac- 
tically impossible  for  his  mutilated  hand  to  hold.  Nahara 
had  five  or  so  knife  blades  in  every  paw  and  a  whole  set 
of  them  in  her  mouth.  She  could  stand  on  four  legs  and 
fight,  and  Warwick  could  not  lift  himself  on  one  elbow 
and  yet  wield  the  blade.  But  there  were  other  things  to 
be  done  with  blades,  even  held  loosely  in  the  palm,  at  a 
time  like  this. 

He  knew  rather  too  much  of  the  way  of  tigers.  They  do 
not  always  kill  swiftly.  It  is  the  tiger  way  to  tease,  long 
moments,  with  half-bared  talons;  to  let  the  prey  crawl  away 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara      31 

a  few  feet  for  the  rapture  of  leaping  at  it  again;  to  fondle 
with  an  exquisite  cruelty  for  moments  that  seem  endless 
to  its  prey.  A  knife,  on  the  other  hand,  kills  quickly. 
Warwick  much  preferred  the  latter  death. 

And  even  as  he  called,  again  and  again,  he  began  to  feel 
about  in  the  grass  with  his  lacerated  hand  for  the  hilt  of 
the  knife.  Nahara  was  steadily  stealing  toward  him  through 
the  shadows. 

The  great  tigress  was  at  the  height  of  her  hunting  mad- 
ness. The  earlier  adventure  of  the  evening  when  she  had 
missed  her  stroke,  the  stir  and  tumult  of  the  beaters  in 
the  wood,  her  many  days  of  hunger,  had  all  combined  to 
intensify  her  passion.  And  finally  there  had  come  the 
knowledge,  in  subtle  ways,  that  two  of  her  own  kind  of 
game  were  lying  wounded  and  helpless  beside  the  ford. 

But  even  the  royal  tiger  never  forgets  some  small  meas- 
ure of  its  caution.  She  did  not  charge  at  once.  The  game 
looked  so  easy  that  it  was  in  some  way  suggestive  of  a  trap. 
She  crept  forward,  a  few  feet  at  a  time.  The  wild  blood 
began  to  leap  through  the  great  veins.  The  hair  went 
stiff  on  the  neck  muscles. 

But  Warwick  shouted;  and  the  sound  for  an  instant  ap- 
palled her.     She  lurked  in  the  shadows. 

Again  she  crept  forward,  to  pause  when  Warwick  raised 
his  voice  the  second  time.  The  man  knew  enough  to  call 
at  intervals  rather  than  continuously.  A  long,  continued 
outcry  would  very  likely  stretch  the  tiger's  nerves  to  a 
breaking  point  and  hurl  her  into  a  frenzy  that  would  prob- 
ably result  in  a  death-dealing  charge.  Every  few  seconds 
he  called  again.  In  the  intervals  between,  the  tiger  crept 
forward.  Her  excitement  grew  upon  her.  She  crouched 
lower.     Her  sinewy  tail  had  whipped  softly  at  first;  now 


32      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

it  was  lashing  almost  to  her  sides.  And  finally  it  began 
to  have  a  slight  vertical  movement  that  Warwick,  for- 
tunately for  his  spirit,  could  not  see. 

Then  the  little  light  that  the  moon  poured  down  was 
suddenly  reflected  in  Nahara's  eyes.  All  at  once  they  burned 
out  of  the  dusk;  two  blue-green  circles  of  fire  fifty  feet 
distant  in  the  darkness.  At  that  Warwick  gasped,  for  the 
first  time.  In  another  moment  the  great  cat  would  be  in 
range,  and  he  had  not  yet  found  the  knife.  Nothing  re- 
mained to  believe  but  that  it  was  lost  in  the  mud  of  the 
ford,  fifty  feet  distant,  and  that  the  last  dread  avenue  of 
escape  was  cut  off. 

But  at  that  instant  the  gasp  gave  way  to  a  whispered 
oath  of  wonder.  Some  living  creature  was  running  lightly 
down  the  trail  toward  him,  soft,  light  feet  that  came  with 
amazing  swiftness.  For  once  in  his  life  Warwick  did  not 
know  where  he  stood.  For  once  he  was  the  chief  figure 
of  a  situation  he  did  not  entirely  understand.  He  tried 
to  probe  into  the  darkness  with  his  tired  eyes. 

"Here  I  am!"  he  called.  The  tiger,  starting  to  creep 
forward  once  more,  halted  at  the  voice.  A  small,  straight 
figure  sped  like  an  arrow  out  of  the  thickets  and  halted 
at  his  side. 

It  was  such  an  astounding  appearance  as  for  an  instant 
completely  paralyzes  the  mental  faculties.  Warwick's  first 
emotion  was  simply  a  great  and  hopeless  astonishment.  Long 
inured  to  the  mystery  of  the  jungle,  he  thought  he  had 
passed  the  point  where  any  earthly  happening  could  actually 
bewilder  him.  But  in  spite  of  it,  in  spite  of  the  fire-eyed 
peril  in  the  darkness,  he  was  quite  himself  when  he  spoke. 
The  voice  that  came  out  of  the  silence  was  wholly  steady, 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara      33 

a  kindly,  almost  amused  voice  of  one  who  knows  life  as 
it  is  and  who  has  mastered  his  own  destiny. 

"Who  in  the  world?"  he  asked  in  the  vernacular. 

"It  is  I — Little  Shikara,"  a  tremulous  voice  answered. 
Except  for  the  tremor  he  could  not  keep  from  his  tone, 
he  spoke  as  one  man  to  another. 

Warwick  knew  at  once  that  Little  Shikara  was  not  yet 
aware  of  the  presence  of  the  tiger,  fifty  feet  distant  in  the 
shadows.  But  he  knew  nothing  else.  The  whole  situation 
was  beyond  his  ken. 

But  his  instincts  were  manly  and  true.  "Then'  run 
speedily,  little  one,"  he  whispered,  "back  to  the  village. 
There  is  danger  here  in  the  dark." 

Little  Shikara  tried  to  speak,  and  he  swallowed  painfully. 
A  lump  had  come  in  his  throat  that  at  first  would  not  let 
him  talk.  "Nay,  Protector  of  the  Poor!"  he  answered.  "I 
— I  came  alone.    And  I — I  am  thy  servant." 

Warwick's  heart  bounded.  Not  since  his  youth  had  left 
him  to  a  gray  world,  had  his  strong  heart  leaped  in  just 
this  way  before.  "Merciful  God !"  he  whispered  in  English. 
"Has  a  child  come  to  save  me?"  Then  he  whipped  again 
into  the  vernacular  and  spoke  swiftly;  for  no  further  sec- 
onds were  to  be  wasted.  "Little  Shikara,  have  you  ever 
fired  a  gun?" 

"No,  Sahib " 

"Then  lift  it  up  and  rest  it  across  my  body.  Thou 
knowest  how  it  is  held " 

Little  Shikara  didn't  know  exactly,  but  he  rested  the  gun 
on  Warwick's  body ;  and  he  had  seen  enough  target  practise 
to  crook  his  finger  about  the  trigger.  And  together,  the 
strangest  pair  of  huntsmen  that  the  Indian  stars  ever  looked 
down  upon,  they  waited. 


34       The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

"It  is  Nahara,"  Warwick  explained  softly.  For  he 
had  decided  to  be  frank  with  Little  Shikara,  trusting  all  to 
the  courage  of  a  child.  "It  all  depends  on  thee.  Pull 
back  the  hammer  with  thy  thumb." 

Little  Shikara  obeyed.  He  drew  it  back  until  it  clicked, 
and  did  not,  as  Warwick  had  feared,  let  it  slip  through 
his  fingers  back  against  the  breach.  "Yes,  Sahib,"  he  whis- 
pered breathlessly.  His  little  brave  heart  seemed  about  to 
explode  in  his  breast.  But  it  was  the  test,  and  he  knew 
he  must  not  waver  in  the  sahib's  eyes. 

"It  is  Nahara,  and  thou  art  a  man,"  Warwick  said  again. 
"And  now  thou  must  wait  until  thou  seest  her  eyes." 

So  they  strained  into  the  darkness;  and  in  an  instant 
more  they  saw  again  the  two  circles  of  greenish,  smolder- 
ing fire.  They  were  quite  near  now — Nahara  was  almost 
in  leaping  range. 

"Thou  wilt  look  through  the  little  hole  at  the  rear  and 
then  along  the  barrel,"  Warwick  ordered  swiftly,  "and 
thou  must  see  the  two  eyes  along  the  little  notch  in  front." 

"I  see,  Sahib — and  between  the  eyes,"  came  the  same 
breathless  whisper.  The  little  brown  body  held  quite  still. 
Warwick  could  not  even  feel  it  trembling  against  his  own. 
For  a  moment,  by  virtue  of  some  strange  prank  of  Shiv,  the 
jungle  gods  were  giving  their  own  strength  to  this  little 
brown  son  of  theirs  beside  the  ford. 

"Thou  wilt  not  jerk  or  move?" 

"Nay,  Sahib."  And  he  spoke  true.  The  world  might 
break  to  pieces  or  blink  out,  but  he  would  not  throw  off 
his  aim  by  any  terror  motions.  They  could  see  the  tiger's 
outline  now,  the  lithe,  low-hung  body,  the  tail  that  twitched 
up  and  down. 

"Then  pull  the  trigger,"  Warwick  whispered. 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara      35 

The  whole  jungle  world  rocked  and  trembled  from  the 
violence  of  the  report. 

When  the  villagers,  aroused  by  the  roar  of  the  rifle  and 
led  by  Khusru  and  Puran  and  Little  Shikara's  father,  rushed 
down  with  their  firebrands  to  the  ford,  their  first  thought 
was  that  they  had  come  only  to  the  presence  of  the  dead. 
Three  human  beings  lay  very  still  beside  the  stream,  and 
fifty  feet  in  the  shadows  something  else,  that  obviously  was 
not  a  human  being,  lay  very  still  too.  But  they  were  not 
to  have  any  such  horror  story  to  tell  their  wives.  Only 
one  of  the  three  by  the  ford,  Singhai,  the  gun-bearer,  was 
even  really  unconscious;  Little  Shikara,  the  rifle  still  held 
lovingly  in  his  arms,  had  gone  into  a  half-faint  from  fear 
and  nervous  exhaustion,  and  Warwick  Sahib  had  merely 
closed  his  eyes  to  the  darting  light  of  the  firebrands.  The 
only  death  that  had  occurred  was  that  of  Nahara  the 
tigress,  and  she  had  a  neat  hole  bored  completely  through 
her  neck.  To  all  evidence,  she  had  never  stirred  after  Little 
Shikara's  bullet  had  gone  home. 

After  much  confusion  and  shoutings  and  falling  over  one 
another,  and  gazing  at  Little  Shikara  as  if  he  were  some 
new  kind  of  a  ghost,  the  villagers  got  a  stretcher  each  for 
Singhai  and  the  Protector  of  the  Poor.  And  when  they  got 
them  well  loaded  into  them,  and  Little  Shikara  had  quite 
come  to  himself  and  was  standing  with  some  bewilderment 
in  the  circle  of  staring  townspeople,  a  clear,  commanding 
voice  ordered  that  they  all  be  silent.  Warwick  Sahib  was 
going  to  make  what  was  the  nearest  approach  to  a  speech 
that  he  had  made  since  various  of  his  friends  had  decoyed 
him  to  a  dinner  in  London  some  years  before. 

The  words  that  he  said,  the  short  vernacular  words  that 


36      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

have  a  way  of  coming  straight  to  the  point,  established 
Little  Shikara  as  a  legend  through  all  that  corner  of  British 
India.  It  was  Little  Shikara  who  had  come  alone  through 
the  jungle,  said  he;  it  was  Little  Shikara's  shining  eyes 
that  had  gazed  along  the  barrel,  and  it  was  his  own  brown 
finger  that  had  pulled  the  trigger.  Thus,  said  Warwick,  he 
would  get  the  bounty  that  the  British  Government  offered, 
British  rupees  that  to  a  child's  eyes  would  be  past  count- 
ing. Thus  in  time,  with  Warwick's  influence,  his  would 
be  a  great  voice  through  all  of  India.  For  small  as  he 
was,  and  not  yet  grown,  he  was  of  the  true  breed. 

After  the  shouting  was  done,  Warwick  turned  to  Little 
Shikara  to  see  how  he  thought  upon  all  these  things.  "Thou 
shalt  have  training  for  the  army,  little  one,  where  thy  good 
nerve  will  be  of  use,  and  thou  shalt  be  a  native  officer, 
along  with  the  sons  of  princes.  I,  myself,  will  see  to  it,  for 
I  do  not  hold  my  life  so  cheap  that  I  will  forget  the  thing 
that  thou  hast  done  to-night." 

And  he  meant  what  he  said.  The  villagers  stood  still 
when  they  saw  his  earnest  face.  "And  what,  little  hawk, 
wilt  thou  have  more?"  he  asked. 

Little  Shikara  trembled  and  raised  his  eyes.  "Only  some- 
times to  ride  with  thee,  in  thy  howdah,  as  thy  servant,  when 
thou  again  seekest  the  tiger." 

The  whole  circle  laughed  at  this.  They  were  just  human, 
after  all.  Their  firebrands  were  held  high,  and  gleamed 
on  Little  Shikara's  dusky  face,  and  made  a  luster  in  his 
dark  eyes.  The  circle,  roaring  with  laughter,  did  not  hear 
the  Sahib's  reply,  but  they  did  see  him  nod  his  head. 

"I  would  not  dare  to  go  without  thee  now,"  Warwick 
told  him. 

And  thus  little  Shikara's  dreams  came  true:  to  be  known 


The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara      37 

through  many  villages  as  a  hunter  of  tigers  and  a  brave 
follower  and  comrade  of  the  forest  trails.  And  thus  he 
came  into  his  own, — in  those  far-off  glades  of  Burma,  in 
the  jungles  of  the  Manipur. 


NEVER  KILL  A  PORCUPINE 

When  the  forest  night  began  to  descend,  Urson  descended 
too.  They  didn't  come  from  the  same  place.  The  forest 
night  seemed  to  come  from  some  strange,  still  land  that 
hung  above  the  mountains,  a  place  remote,  more  wild  and 
new  than  the  earth.  It  dropped  down  like  a  curtain,  soft 
and  mysterious  and  vibrant.  Urson  came  from  the  top 
of  the  pine  trees  where  he  had  been  sleeping. 

It  is  a  most  peculiar  thing  about  the  porcupine  that  he 
needs  and  takes  more  sleep  than  any  other  forest  creature. 
There  doesn't  seem  to  be  any  reason  why  this  should  be 
so,  except  that  he  doesn't  have  any  way  in  particular  to  spend 
his  time.  His  nerves  certainly  do  not  need  rest.  He  never 
strains  them,  either  by  thinking  or  hunting,  or  any  other 
way.  He  was  just  old  Urson,  forgetful  and  stupid  and 
slow,  that  to  most  people  does  not  matter  at  all. 

Yet  he  does  matter.  His  bristly  body  would  not  be 
known  in  the  forest  if  it  were  not  so.  There  are  certain 
laws  in  the  wild  that  no  man  has  wit  enough  completely 
to  understand,  and  the  presence  of  Urson  has  been  decreed 
by  one  of  those  laws.  Life  is  too  hard  in  the  wild  for 
useless  existences.  He  has  his  place,  just  as  immutable  as 
the  graceful  cougar  or  the  swift  deer,  and  he  fills  it  in  his 
own  way.  He  matters  in  general  and  he  matters  in  par- 
ticular. Although  the  squirrels  scarcely  gave  him  a  glance, 
and  the  grouse,  knowing  that  Urson  didn't  eat  meat  for  one 
thing  and  that,  if  he  did,  he  couldn't  catch  it,  for  another, 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  39 

insulted  him  by  perching  within  three  feet  of  his  spiny  body ; 
to  one  particular  creature  at  least  his  presence  in  the  pine 
tree  was  of  utmost  importance.  This  creature  was  the 
buzzard,  watching  from  the  clouds. 

He  had  been  keeping  an  eye  on  the  porcupine  a  large 
part  of  the  afternoon.  The  reason  was  perfectly  obvious. 
The  porcupines  were  notoriously  short-lived.  The  buzzard 
was  much  more  interested  in  death  than  in  life;  and  in 
these  latter  days,  when  the  hills  were  full  of  human  hunters, 
few  of  these  mammals  lived  to  get  their  full  growth.  It 
was  not  that  they  were  particularly  good  game,  or  that 
their  quill-covered  skins  were  of  any  value.  It  was  just 
that  they  couldn't  run  away  and  thoughtless  sportsmen  from 
the  valleys,  who  could  not  shoot  straight  enough  to  hit  the 
deer  or  see  clearly  enough  to  distinguish  a  cougar  on  the 
pine  limbs,  or  walk  stealthily  enough  to  approach  a  wolf, 
found  them  good  targets  for  marksmanship.  They  usually 
didn't  even  bother  to  carry  the  creatures  home;  and  this 
made  their  hunting  all  the  more  interesting  to  the  buzzard. 
And  as  a  result  of  all  these  things,  the  breed  was  almost  gone 
from  the  Oregon  woods.  Of  the  thousands  that  used  to  be, 
scarcely  scores  remained. 

The  buzzard  in  the  clouds  had  felt  quite  sure  that  his 
watch  would  soon  be  rewarded.  Surely  some  plainsman 
would  soon  want  to  try  his  sights  on  the  awkward  body. 
He  felt  extremely  sorry  when  the  shadows  came  down  and 
hid  Urson.  But  he  would  look  for  him  again  in  the  morn- 
ing; and  anything  might  happen  before  the  night  was  done. 
Things  have  a  way  of  happening  in  the  mountain  night,  and 
the  buzzard  is  most  thankful.  "I  own  the  forest,"  he  tells 
his  fledglings,  "for  all  living  things  therein  return  to  me 
in  the  end." 


40      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

When  one  stops  to  think  about  it,  one  can  see  how  this 
is  true.  It  explains  very  clearly  the  watch  he  keeps  over 
the  forest.  He  is  the  undertaker,  and  it  is  his  business  to 
find  out  about  every  death.  For  certain  reasons  of  his  own, 
he  likes  to  be  present  when  it  happens.  He  is  ineffably 
patient.  He  knows,  better  than  all  other  creatures,  what  a 
universal  and  inevitable  thing  death  is  and  that,  if  he  only 
waits  long  enough,  he  will  surely  win.  From  his  place 
in  the  clouds  he  sees  the  beginning  and  the  end  of  all 
things;  for  every  cub  that  is  cleaned  by  its  mother's  tongue 
in  the  sunlight  will  sometime  lie  still  on  the  hillside, — ripe 
and  ready  for  his  sharp  beak.  Every  bird  that  flies,  and 
every  cougar,  proud  in  his  strength  and  grace,  every  wolf, 
howling  triumph  from  the  ridges,  is  a  prospect,  as  the  book 
agents  say,  worth  watching  day  and  night  with  tireless  eyes. 

Every  hunter  that  starts  from  his  cabin  in  the  dawn  is 
worth  watching  too,  for  some  part  of  each  deer  he  shoots 
will  not  be  worth  carrying  into  camp;  and  then  the  buz- 
zard's hour  will  come.  And,  for  that  matter,  there  have 
been  times  when  the  hunters  themselves  failed  to  come  back 
to  camp !  In  the  mountains,  such  things  as  sudden  blizzards 
and  unsteady  boulders  on  a  precipice  and  getting  lost  often 
upset  a  hunter's  plans  in  regard  to  his  homecoming;  and  the 
buzzard  croaks  his  joy.  But  of  all  the  living  things  he 
watches,  none  of  them  return  to  him  so  surely  and  quickly 
as  the  porcupines. 

The  story  of  Urson  is  the  story  of  how  once  the  buzzard 
watched  in  vain.  It  is  the  tale  of  how,  for  once,  the  thing 
that  he  told  his  fledglings  did  not  come  true.  But  more 
than  that,  the  story  of  Urson,  climbing  down  the  pine  trunk 
in  the  evening,  is  the  illustration  of  that  immutable  forest 
law, — that  all  things  are  because  they  need  to  be,  and  that 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  41 

even  such  a  blunt,  stupid,  guileless  creature  as  old  Urson  has 
his  place  to  fill  in  the  eternal  scheme  of  things. 

He  looked  just  like  some  enormous  variety  of  burr,  as 
he  waited  a  moment  at  the  base  of  the  pine.  One  who  has 
never  seen  a  porcupine  cannot  possibly  imagine  what  gro- 
tesque creatures  they  are.  The  biggest  of  them  weighs  forty 
pounds,  as  large  as  a  good-sized  bear  cub.  They  have  a 
hump  like  a  dromedary;  but  it  isn't  the  kind  of  hump  a 
desert-farer  would  care  to  ride  upon.  They  have  curiously 
flat  tails,  and  little  heads,  and  long  claws  that  they  use  in 
climbing,  much  as  a  man  uses  his  fingers.  But  the  most 
curious  thing  about  them  is  the  armor  that  they  wear.  Their 
furry  hides  are  simply  full  of  quills,  each  as  sharp  as  the 
sharpest  needle. 

Urson  did  not  leave  the  tree  trunk  at  once.  Life  in  the 
forest  is  a  matter  of  always  having  an  immediate  refuge.  He 
was  able  to  get  about  fairly  swiftly  in  a  tree.  He  could 
climb  out  on  limbs  that  would  not  bear  a  cougar's  weight. 
But  he  was  almost  helpless  on  the  ground.  So  before  he 
ventured  out  he  took  a  long  look  about  him,  and  sniffed 
the  air  for  any  smells  of  danger.  Then  he  crept  slowly 
out  into  the  thickets. 

The  forest  was  wakening.  It  sleeps  during  the  day; 
but  now  it  was  full  of  the  stir  of  waking  wild  creatures. 
A  deer  was  stealing  forth  from  the  buckbush,  softly,  ravished 
by  the  age-old  mystery  of  the  mountain  night.  Urson  waited, 
a  shadow  in  the  deep  brush,  till  it  was  past.  It  wasn't 
that  a  deer  is  a  creature  of  which  the  porcupine  needs  to 
be  afraid.  It  was  just  that  Urson  could  not  see  for  sure 
whether  the  animal  was  really  a  deer.  His  eyes  were  none 
too  good.    He  hovered  an  instant,  relying  on  his  keener  nose 


42       The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

to  tell  him  the  truth.  Truly,  it  was  just  old  Blacktail, 
climbing  to  his  feeding  grounds  on  the  ridges. 

Urson  trotted  on  farther  into  the  underbrush,  halting  at 
last  beside  a  spring  at  the  head  of  the  glen.  It  was  one  of 
those  little  mountain  springs,  fairly  choked  with  ferns,  that 
are  sometimes  found  fresh  and  cool  even  in  the  hottest 
seasons.  But  it  was  not  the  water  that  interested  Urson.  It 
is  an  interesting  quality  in  the  porcupine  that  he  requires 
less  water  than  any  other  living  creature  of  his  weight.  The 
dew  that  lies  on  his  green  food  is  usually  enough  for  him; 
and  he  can  go  literally  weeks  without  actually  drinking. 
And  thus  he  escapes  the  terrible  fear  of  the  drouth  that 
is  one  of  the  terrors  of  the  forest  folk.  The  spring  was 
interesting  to  him  solely  because  of  the  roots  and  tender 
plants  that  grew  in  it. 

Something  splashed  in  the  mud;  and  Urson  felt  the 
thrill  and  movement  of  the  skin  along  his  back, — always  the 
first  reflex  of  any  terror.  Human  beings,  frightened  speech- 
less, have  the  same  feeling,  a  hideous  creeping  of  the  flesh 
that  never  can  be  forgotten.  But  it  has  no  particular  function 
with  men.  It  is  just  a  race  memory,  a  reflex,  from  more 
savage  times  in  the  world's  young  days.  With  many  of  the 
beasts,  it  serves  to  make  the  hair  on  the  neck  and  shoulders 
stand  erect.  With  the  porcupines,  it  changes  the  smooth- 
lying  quills  into  a  perfect  armor  of  bristling  points.  They 
suddenly  stand  out  in  all  directions,  a  formidable  defense 
against  attack. 

But  the  function  was  not  quite  completed  when  Urson  rec- 
ognized the  inhabitant  of  the  spring.  He  had  thought 
it  might  be  a  serpent  at  first.  Serpents  are  among  the  tradi- 
tional enemies  of  the  porcupine.  It  could  have  easily  been  a 
rattlesnake,  cooling  itself  in  the  damp  weeds.     But  it  was 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  43 

only  a  water  dog, — one  of  those  curious  little  lizards  that 
look  like  baby  crocodiles,  and  come  from  heaven  knows 
where  to  live  in  the  cold  mountain  springs.  They  are  usu- 
ally alone,  and  how  they  traverse  the  miles  of  parched  moun- 
tains to  find  the  spot  is  beyond  the  wit  of  man  to  tell. 

Urson  had  thrown  down  his  root  when  he  first  heard 
the  creature,  and  by  now  he  had  forgotten  all  about  it; 
he  was  notoriously  absent-minded.  He  soon  found  an- 
other, and  holding  it  in  his  forepaws  as  a  squirrel  holds  a 
nut,  he  began  to  munch  it.  Then  he  had  some  stringy 
plants,  followed  by  the  tender  bark  off  the  young  shrubs. 
He  did  not  eat  fast.  The  evening  grew  to  late  night  before 
he  was  filled. 

The  rustle  of  forest  life  went  on  about  him.  Night  birds 
called.  The  little  under  people,  the  creatures  of  the  lower 
plane  that  burrow  in  the  ground,  whispered  and  rustled  in 
the  deep  shadows  just  beyond.  Once  a  gopher  emerged 
from  its  subterranean  tunnel,  heard  the  clumsy  body  in  the 
lush  ferns,  and  ducked  quickly  back.  The  gopher  was 
blind,  and  he  could  not  see  that  it  was  just  old  Urson,  the 
porcupine.  Perhaps  the  latter  felt  somewhat  proud  that 
one  living  creature,  at  least,  had  fled  from  him.  Once  a 
chipmunk  watched  him,  utterly  motionless,  from  the  thick 
stalks  of  the  underbrush.  Only  moving  things  can  be  dis- 
tinguished by  Urson's  ineffective  eyes. 

The  moon  rose,  and  the  wind  that  starts  down  from 
the  snow  field  at  midnight  began  to  sway  the  tops  of  the 
pines.  This  is  always  an  hour  of  mystery  in  the  forest. 
The  thickets,  too  dense  and  heavy  for  the  moonbeams  to 
penetrate,  whisper  and  throb  with  life.  All  the  sounds 
are  hushed  and  strange;  and,  some  way,  they  give  an  im- 
pression of  a  stupendous  silence.     All  the  forest  creatures 


44      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

move  with  stealing  steps,  with  scarcely  the  rustle  of  a  leaf 
or  a  crack  of  a  dry  twig.  Urson  grunted,  and  climbed 
laboriously  up  the  hill. 

He  began  to  wonder  why  he  saw  none  of  his  kind.  He 
did  not  know  that  the  breed  of  porcupine  was  almost  gone 
from  the  Oregon  woods.  He  only  knew  that  he  wanted 
companionship, — a  female,  perhaps,  or  maybe  a  playmate 
that  would  follow  him  on  an  exploring  trip  to  the  top  of 
the  distant  ridge.  It  took  a  lot  of  courage  to  go  alone. 
There  were  so  many  strange  smells  and  terrifying  noises. 
His  memory  only  went  so  far  as  to  realize  his  meetings 
with  his  own  kind  had  been  ever  fewer  as  the  years  had 
passed.  In  fact,  he  could  hardly  recall  the  last  time  that 
he  and  a  quilled  brother  had  sniffed  and  made  friends  in 
the  moonlight. 

A  flock  of  grouse  heard  his  heavy  step  in  the  brush  and 
darted  from  their  covert.  They  made  a  terrifying  noise. 
Urson  waited,  perfectly  silent,  till  the  last  echo  had  died 
away.  Then  he  halted  to  strip  the  bark  from  a  vine  that 
covered  a  rotten  stump.  A  snowshoe  rabbit — people  say 
they  are  called  snowshoes  because  of  their  enormous  feet 
that  holds  them  up  on  the  snow  drifts — pointed  two  ques- 
tioning ears  to  him;  then  hopped  away  on  missions  of  his 
own. 

The  forest  sounds  grew  louder.  The  meat  eaters  were 
hunting.  Far  away,  from  the  top  of  some  remote  ridge,  a 
wolf  howl  rose  and  fell.  It  was  very  faint,  and  more  sad 
than  the  saddest  music  of  a  Master.  Urson  stood  straining, 
listening  to  the  far  call.  But  soon  the  silence  swallowed  it, 
and  he  could  hear  it  no  more. 

He  crept  on,  more  softly  now.  Sometimes  he  stopped 
to  feed,  and  more  than  once  he  whirled  to  meet  some  sud- 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  45 

den  sound  behind  him.  The  night  drew  toward  dawn, 
till  at  last  a  tiny  ribbon  of  lighted  sky  lay  all  along  the 
eastern  mountains.  And  nothing  remained  to  do  but  find  a 
good  resting  place  for  the  day. 

But  still  he  loitered.  Perhaps  the  mystery  of  the  night 
had  hold  of  him.  Perhaps  he  was  not  so  blunt  and  dull  but 
that  he  was  lonesome  for  some  of  his  own  kind.  He  was 
taking  risks  by  lingering  in  the  thickets  while  the  dawn  came 
out.  At  least  he  should  keep  close  to  a  tree,  ready  at  any 
instant  to  crawl  to  safety  in  its  high  limbs.  The  shadows 
were  receding  swiftly ;  and  he  found  himself  in  the  middle  of 
an  old  burn,  grown  to  heavy  brush.  Except  for  the  bare, 
black  ruins,  the  nearest  tree  was  nearly  two  hundred  feet 
distant.  Scarce  understanding  his  own  sudden  alarm,  he 
ambled  quickly  toward  it.  Perhaps  there  was  a  faint  smell 
on  the  wind  that  his  blunt  mind  had  not  yet  interpreted,  but 
of  which  his  instincts  had  warned.  And  he  was  still  one 
hundred  feet  from  the  questionable  safety  of  the  tree  when 
he  met  the  cougar  cub. 

The  thing  suddenly  sprang  from  the  buckbush,  not  ten 
feet  from  him.  It  weighed  hardly  more  than  Urson  him- 
self; it  was  graceful  and  tawny  and  only  one  year  old;  yet 
the  porcupine  had  no  delusions  whatever  about  it.  In  the 
days  when  he  was  a  little,  blind,  puppy  porcupine,  his  mother 
had  told  him  stories  of  the  Death  whose  eyes  are  green 
lights  in  the  darkness.  He  knew  from  instinct  what  the 
claws  were  like.  Urson's  only  hope  was  that  the  young 
cougar  has  not  yet  had  lessons  in  the  way  of  handling  por- 
cupines. 

Urson  ordinarily  moves  very  slowly.  He  is  the  snail 
among  beasts.  Yet  not  even  the  cougar  himself  could  have 
got  on   the  defensive  more  quickly.     His  quills  had  been 


46      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

lying  smoothly  all  over  his  furry  hide.  In  a  single  instant, 
each  of  them  stood  erect  and  stiff,  each  one  a  formidable 
weapon  of  defense.  He  seemed  simply  to  double  in  size. 
His  tail  swelled  too.  What  had  been  before  a  harmless- 
looking  rodent  thing  was  now  a  living  phalanx  of  sharp 
spines. 

The  cougar  did  not  know  what  to  make  of  him.  He 
had  never  seen  a  porcupine  before.  He  knew  perfectly 
that  here  was  meat.  His  instinct  told  him  that  the  creature 
was  fair  game;  yet  he  was  frankly  puzzled  as  to  how  to 
make  the  attack.  Urson  did  not  try  to  flee,  and  this  was 
a  curious  thing:  he  simply  sat  still,  hunched  up  into  a 
grotesque,  burr-like  ball,  as  if  waiting  for  the  cub  to  make 
the  first  move. 

It  would  have  been  very  nice  for  Urson  to  have  been 
able  to  shoot  his  quills,  as  so  many  story  books  say  he  does. 
A  well-directed  quill  or  two  might  have  relieved  the  situa- 
tion at  once.  But  in  reality,  he  could  only  rattle  them  to- 
gether and  squeal  his  anger. 

The  noise  the  quills  made  sounded  ominous  at  first.  The 
cub  kept  his  distance.  But  as  he  waited,  as  Urson  still 
sat  in  his  ridiculous  hump  on  the  ground,  his  courage  came 
back  to  him.  He  began  slowly  to  walk  about  the  crea- 
ture, ever  narrowing  his  circle  and  snarling  as  furiously  as 
he  could.  Then  he  suddenly  stretched  out  a  cautious  paw 
to  strike  at  it. 

It  was  the  worst  thing  he  could  have  done  and  was  one 
of  the  most  painful  mistakes  of  his  whole  life.  If  he  had 
been  a  wiser  little  cougar,  he  would  never  have  stretched 
his  paw  at  all.  The  porcupine  is  a  great  deal  like  a  nettle, 
— a  tight  hold  on  him  is  less  painful  than  a  touch.  The 
wisest  way  would  have  been  to  crush  the  creature's  head  with 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  47 

one  furious  leap  and  bite.  It  might  have  also  been  ef- 
fective to  have  scooped  him  over  with  an  upper-cut  blow 
and  attacked  the  abdomen.  The  throat  was  an  exposed  place, 
too;  and  why  nature  should  have  left  such  a  vital  spot 
unprotected  is  the  final  proof  that  Urson  has  not  had 
a  square  deal  in  the  world. 

Urson  suddenly  lashed  out  with  his  thorny  tail.  He 
struck  the  cub  fairly  across  the  nose.  The  animal  leaped 
back,  shrieking  with  pain.  At  least  four  of  the  tiny  spines 
were  stuck  fast  in  the  soft  flesh  of  his  nose. 

He  could  not  get  them  out.  He  rolled  about  in  vain, 
tearing  and  striking  at  them.  Then  he  sat  down  and  howled 
in  agony,  all  fight  taken  out  of  him.  The  adventure  would 
have  ended  at  that  instant  except  for  one  thing,  the  thing 
that  Urson  dreaded  most. — A  cougar  cub  means  a  full- 
grown  cougar  somewhere  about.  The  mother,  hunting  on 
the  hillside,  had  heard  the  call  of  pain  and  came  bound- 
ing to  the  rescue. 

She  was  no  foolish  cub,  to  expose  her  nose  to  the  swish- 
ing tail.  She  had  dealt  with  porcupines  before.  She  knew 
just  how  to  handle  them.  She  took  in  the  situation  at 
a  glance,  lapped  once  at  her  baby's  tortured  nose,  and  stole 
up  close  to  Urson.  But  she  did  not  get  too  close.  She 
knew  that  the  porcupine  could  not  move  quickly  on  his 
awkward  legs,  and  she  remained  just  out  of  range  of  the 
tail.  The  porcupine  backed  away,  but  she  kept  the  same 
distance  between  them.  She  was  looking  for  the  instant 
when  his  throat  would  offer  a  fair  mark — then  her  head 
would  lash  out. 

When  meat  was  plentiful  she  had  often  passed  the  porcu- 
pines by.  They  were  awkward  to  eat,  for  one  thing,  and 
hardly  big  enough  to  be  interesting  for  another.     But  she 


48      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

had  missed  her  kill  to-night.  Her  disposition  was  at  its 
worst.  Besides,  the  thing  had  injured  the  joy  and  pride 
of  her  life,   her  tawny  cub. 

Urson  squealed  and  rattled  his  quills  in  vain.  It  was 
simply  a  waiting  game,  with  death  inevitable  in  the  end. 
There  was  no  hope  whatever  of  intimidating  this  tawny 
creature.     It  was  the  worst  moment  in  all  of  Urson's  life. 

But  just  then  there  came  an  interlude.  Urson  was  not 
to  die  in  the  cougar's  claws  after  all.  For  suddenly,  with 
no  apparent  cause,  the  great  sinuous  creature  whirled  on 
her  velvet  paws  to  face  the  long  slope  behind  her. 

She  seemed  at  once  to  forget  his  existence.  She  seemed 
to  forget  her  cub,  and  all  the  madness  and  rapture  of  the 
hunt.  The  green  light  died  in  her  eyes.  Her  body  sank 
lower,  the  lashing  tail  stood  still.  In  an  instant  the  queen 
of  the  forest  was  reduced  to  a  cowering,  terrified,  impotent 
thing  that  could  not  even  fight  for  her  own  offspring. 

Urson  could  not  understand  at  first.  His  senses  were 
blunt,  and  he  could  neither  hear  nor  see  the  approach  of 
this  new  foe.  True,  a  strange  smell  hung  heavy  in  the 
air.  And  what  hunter  was  so  mighty  that  even  WhisperfootJ 
was  afraid? 

But  then,  as  the  forest  sounds  died  out,  Urson  could  hear 
its  footsteps.  They  were  curiously  heavy,  the  step  of  one 
who  tried  to  walk  with  silence,  but  really  made  more  noise 
than  old  Woof,  shuffling  through  the  buckbush.  They 
were  hard  feet,  too,  not  the  soft  pads  of  the  forest  creatures. 
They  did  not  sound  at  all  the  same.  The  cougar  and  her 
cub  faded  and  blended  into  the  brown  thickets, — simply 
brown  smoke  that  vanished  as  if  by  a  magician's  magic. 
Then  Urson  lifted  his  head,  and  saw. 

Two   tall   forms  were   swinging   down   the   ridge — two 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  49 

curious,  forked  creatures,  walking  on  the  hind  legs.  Urson 
did  not  know  his  danger.  It  was  the  moment  the  buzzard 
had  been  watching  for  all  the  previous  day.  If  the  cougar 
had  killed  Urson,  the  buzzard's  meal,  except  for  the  spiny 
hide,  would  have  been  postponed.  The  cougar  would  have 
eaten  him  herself.  But  human  hunters  left  their  dead  on 
the  hillside.  These  two  coming  down  the  slope  were  men, 
armed  with  guns.  And  likely  one  of  them  would  want 
to  test  his  marksmanship  on  the  grotesque,  bristling  body. 

The  two  that  came  stealing  down  the  ridge  in  the  dawn 
didn't  look  like  the  usual  type  of  mountain  men.  The 
residents  of  the  hills  are  usually  gaunt  and  dark,  and  have 
a  peculiar,  shuffling  stride  that  once  learned  never  is  for- 
gotten. One  of  the  two,  the  man  who  walked  in  front,  was 
dressed  in  the  tans  and  puttees  that  men  call  outing  clothes. 
They  were  new  and  obviously  of  great  cost.  A  new  rifle 
lay  in  the  hollow  of  his  arm.  He  was  a  middle-aged  man, 
clean-shaven;  and  his  strong  features  and  straightforward 
eyes  represented  the  best  of  Western  civilization.  It  was 
not  an  unattractive  face  at  all.  But  no  one  had  to  look 
twice  at  him  to  know  he  was  that  creature  whom  the  moun- 
taineers call  a  tenderfoot.  In  fact,  this  was  his  first  big- 
game  hunt  in  the  Oregon  mountains. 

The  other  man  was  strikingly  different.  He  was  not 
even  of  the  same  race.  Even  the  forest  creatures  might 
have  told  this  much.  His  carriage  was  different,  his  hair 
grew  long  and  straight  and  black,  and  his  face  had  a  rather 
pleasant  copper  color.  He  was  the  kind  of  man  that  the 
West  used  to  know  before  degeneracy  came  upon  its  ab- 
origines. He  was  Long  Tom,  the  Indian, — trapper  and 
mountaineer  and  guide. 


50      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

"Wait,"  the  white  man  warned.  "It's  a  porcupine,  isn't 
it  ?    Chance  to  see  if  I  can  hit  anything  with  this  gun." 

He  raised  his  rifle  to  his  shoulder  and  peered  along  its 
barrel.  He  couldn't  miss.  The  creature  was  scarcely  fifty 
yards  distant,  standing  still  and  exposed  in  the  clearing. 
The  long,  blundering  trail  of  Urson  had  evidently  come 
to  an  end  at  last. 

He  did  not  realize  his  danger.  He  had  never  seen  men 
before.  Possibly  they  were  too  far  away  for  him  to  see 
clearly;  besides,  his  instincts  only  warned  him  when  foes 
came  close.  Even  now  his  quills  were  lying  down  again, 
and  he  was  preparing  to  find  refuge  in  the  nearest  tree. 

Booth,  as  the  man  was  known,  saw  him  clearly  between 
the  sights  of  the  rifle.  But  before  ever  his  finger  could  press 
back  on  the  trigger,  Long  Tom  stepped  beside  him. 

"Ugh !"  he  grunted  disapprovingly.  He  stretched  a  brown 
arm  and  quietly  took  the  rifle  from  the  man's  hands.  Calmly 
he  slipped  the  hammer  back  against  the  breach  and  handed 
back  the  weapon.     Booth  looked  at  him  in  wonder. 

"Never  kill  a  porcupine — for  sport,"  the  Indian  said 
simply. 

Booth  looked  from  the  beast  to  the  man.  "Why  not, 
Tom?"  he  asked.     He  almost  whispered  the  question. 

But  the  Indian  made  no  answer.  He  stolidly  kept  on, 
down  the  trail. 

The  .man  walked  with  him  in  silence  for  a  moment.  "I'm 
rather  curious,  Tom,"  he  went  on  at  last.  "Why  didn't 
you  want  me  to  shoot  that  porcupine?" 

The  Indian  answered  as  if  his  thoughts  were  far  away. 
"The  white  man  will  find  out — sometime,"  he  replied.  "If 
he  hunts  long  enough  in  the  forests,  maybe  he  know.  But 
your  children  wish  you  never  know." 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  51 

Booth  asked  no  more  questions.  He  knew  his  guide.  He 
had  learned  the  silent  ways  of  the  Indian;  and  he  felt  that 
he  had  probed  into  a  mountain  law  that  is  not  meant  for 
tenderfeet  to  know.  Once  they  have  learned,  by  experience 
made  known,  they  cease  to  be  tenderfeet.  As  for  the  Indian, 
perhaps  no  conscious  experience  prompted  the  words.  Per- 
haps it  was  just  a  tradition,  or  even  an  instinct, — such  im- 
pulses as  civilization  has  cost  white  men  the  power  to  feel. 
The  two  went  on,  silently  in  the  dawn,  and  left  Urson 
to  climb  his  tree  in  peace. 

The  Indians  used  to  believe  unquestioningly  in  the  ex- 
istence of  forest  gods.  Long  Tom  still  believed  in  them. 
But  whether  or  not  they  Teally  existed,  some  power  decreed 
that  before  ever  Chandos  Booth  was  to  return  to  his  wife 
and  fireside,  he  was  to  lose  the  name  of  tenderfoot.  He 
was  to  become  a  forester,  with  the  shadow  of  the  pines  on 
his  spirit. 

It  happened  on  the  fourth  day  of  his  hunt.  He  had 
met  Urson  on  the  first.  Three  days  thereafter  he  had 
wandered  with  his  guide  over  the  high  plateaus,  and  already 
his  outing  clothes  were  stained  and  out  of  press.  He  had 
killed  some  game.  The  fourth  day  he  was  in  the  region 
of  the  Umpqua  Divide,  a  certain  waste  of  endless  ridges 
that  divide  the  valleys  of  the  Umpqua  and  the  Rogue  rivers, 
— two  salmon-choked  streams  that  race  through  southern 
Oregon.  The  divide  itself  was  not  a  particularly  attractive 
country.  It  had  not  too  many  springs,  its  forests  were  end- 
less, and  the  ridges  looked  all  alike. 

"You  will  follow  down  through  the  glen  and  drive  out 
any  deer,"  he  told  his  guide  in  the  morning.  "I  will  walk 
along  the  hillside,  and  shoot  'em  as  they  come  out." 

"Then  keep  me  in  sight,"  the  Indian  warned. 


52      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

Booth  simply  laughed.  He  had  a  very  charming,  boyish 
laugh  that  was  good  to  hear.  But  if  he  had  known  the 
mountains,  their  way  of  playing  tricks  on  the  unsuspecting, 
he  would  have  listened  soberly  and  heeded. 

He  did  not  keep  the  Indian  in  sight.  He  followed  along 
the  crest  of  the  ridge  and  was  much  surprised  to  find  the 
canyon  in  front  of  him,  rather  than  to  the  left.  He  ex- 
plained it,  with  an  instant's  thought,  by  the  fact  that  it 
likely  curved  about  the  base  of  the  hill.  He  was  quite 
unaware  that  he  had  inadvertently  crossed  over  the  ridge, 
and  was  looking  into  a  different  canyon.  It  is  a  thing 
very  easy  to  do  in  the  mountains. 

He  went  down  into  the  canyon,  looking  for  Long  Tom. 
On  the  way  he  got  into  a  perfect  jungle  of  buckbush,  and 
after  a  futile  effort  to  fight  his  way  through  it,  the  toil 
of  a  solid  hour  that  sped  faster  than  he  thought,  he  made 
a  wide  detour  around  it.    Then  he  called  for  Long  Tom. 

He  assumed,  of  course,  that  the  Indian  was  waiting  on 
top  of  the  next  ridge,  as  was  planned.  So  he  felt  no  par- 
ticular worry.  Even  if  he  didn't  find  him,  he  had  only 
to  stride  back  into  camp.  Long  Tom  could  come  in  alone. 
So  he  forced  his  way  up  a  steep  ridge  to  the  hill  where 
he  had  told  the  Indian  to  wait.  It  never  even  occurred 
to  him  that  he  could  be  mistaken  in  the  hill. 

Perhaps  the  Indian  had  encountered  the  buckbush  and 
had  not  yet  reached  the  point.  He  decided  to  wait.  He 
waited  over  a  half-hour,  and  the  woods  seemed  to  grow 
more  silent.  He  was  hot  too,  and  wanted  a  drink.  He 
decided  he  would  descend  into  the  valley  to  find  one. 

But  all  that  he  found  was  the  buckbush;  and  he  was 
tired  and  disgruntled  by  the  time  he  had  forced  his  way 
out  of  it.     And  the  appearance  of  the  sun  was  a  surprise 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  53 

to  him.  It  didn't  seem  to  be  in  quite  the  right  place;  and, 
besides,  it  was  very  high.  He  glanced  at  his  watch.  It 
was  already  past  noon. 

Before  they  had  left  camp,  on  the  first  day,  the  two 
of  them  had  arranged  for  signals.  Booth  had  thought  it 
a  piece  of  foolishness.  He  was  used  to  finding  his  way 
around  alone.  But  the  Indian  was  insistent.  So  they 
told  each  other  that  in  case  they  wanted  an  answer,  each 
would  fire  three  shots  swiftly,  then  two  more  at  an  in- 
terval of  ten  seconds  each.  He  took  out  his  watch;  then 
blazed  into  the  trunk  of  a  great  pine. 

But  when  he  pulled  the  trigger  the  fifth  time,  the  hammer 
clanged  down  upon  an  empty  breech.  He  had  forgotten 
that  he  had  shot  at  the  brown  flash  of  a  deer  in  the  early 
morning,  after  which  he  had  not  reloaded.  By  the  time 
he  had  seized  a  shell,  inserted  it,  and  fired  again,  another 
ten  seconds  had  elapsed. 

He  thought  possibly  that  the  signal  sounded  enough  like 
the  one  agreed  upon  and  that  the  Indian  would  answer. 
So  he  waited  two  full  minutes.  The  woods  remained 
ominously  silent. 

So  he  decided  to  give  the  signal  again.  Perhaps  the 
Indian  had  thought  he  was  merely  shooting  at  game.  Long 
Tom  was  a  sort  of  rattle-brain,  anyway, — or  why  should  he 
have  objected  to  his  shooting  the  porcupine?  He  felt  in 
his  shell  pocket  and  reloaded  his  rifle.  His  pocket  felt 
rather  light,  but  he  did  not  particularly  notice  the  fact. 
He  fired  five  times  more,  giving  the  signal  perfectly. 

Again  he  waited,  and  again  the  woods  were  still.  There 
remained  no  other  possibility  but  that  the  Indian  was  too 
far  distant  for  the  sound  of  the  rifle  crack  to  reach  him. 

But  except  for  a  strange  and  inner  feeling  of  discomfort, 


,r*  '^ 


54      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

he  was  not  at  all  worried.  He  would  simply  hunt  back 
along  the  ridges,  and  go  into  camp.  It  was  possibly  ten 
miles  distant.  The  Indian  would  come  in  the  twilight.  He 
began  to  load  his  gun. 

It  held  five  shots.  One  other  remained  in  his  pocket. 
In  the  manner  of  most  hunters,  seeking  deer,  he  had  not 
laden  himself  down  with  useless  cartridges.  He  had  taken 
seventeen, — for  rare  is  the  hunter  who  gets  more  than  seven- 
teen shots  at  big  game  in  a  single  day.  One  had  been  fired 
away  in  the  morning,  and  ten  were  expended  in  the  futile 
signals. 

He  started  out  in  what  he  supposed  was  the  direction  of 
camp.  The  trail  was  remarkably  hard  going.  He  didn't 
remember  such  steep  cliffs  and  towering  rocks  on  the  way 
out.  The  hills,  however,  looked  identical,,  He  felt  there 
could  be  no  possibility  of  a  mistake. 

All  at  once  his  trail  ended  in  a  veritable  wall  of  buck- 
bush.  But  the  hour  was  growing  late;  so  he  decided  to 
push  his  way  through  it.  He  did  get  through  it,  in  the 
end.  Let  that  be  said  in  tribute  to  the  man's  strength  and 
determination,  although  it  was  a  condemnation  of  his  good 
sense  as  far  as  progression  through  the  mountains  was  con- 
cerned. He  battled  through  that  brushy  wall  for  three 
long  hours.     It  seemed  to  go  on  forever. 

He  was  very  tired  and  very  thirsty,  and  was  beginning 
to  feel  hungry  by  the  time  he  had  reached  the  open  forest. 
He  came  out  upon  a  rock-strewn  ridge  that  he  could  not 
remember  seeing  before.  And  as  he  stood,  breathing  hard, 
on  the  white-hot  shale,  he  saw  the  buzzard  for  the  first 
time.  It  was  riding  low  in  the  sky,  and  it  seemed  to  be 
watching  him. 

He  glanced  at  it  indifferently  at  first,  then  he  studied  it 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  55 

with  squinted  eyes.  Yes,  the  thing  seemed  to  be  keeping  an 
eye  on  him.  And  because  the  shadow  of  the  pines  was  be- 
ginning to  deepen  on  his  spirit,  because  he  was  beginning 
to  know  the  mountains,  their  strength  and  their  remorse- 
lessness,  he  felt  a  shiver  of  hate  and  fear  that  was  at  once 
burning  and  freezing  through  his  nerves. 

Then  he  started  doggedly  on  toward  camp.  Let  it 
never  be  doubted  but  that  Chandos  Booth  was  a  man  of  the 
first  water.  Kind  husband,  gentle  father,  he  was  also  strong- 
sinewed  and  great-spirited.  He  held  a  high  place  in  the 
valleys  below  him.  His  influence  spread  farther  even  than 
the  mountains, — and  they  seemed  to  be  endless.  He  did 
not  permit  his  fatigue  to  blunt  and  dull  his  thought.  He 
came  soberly  to  the  conclusion  that,  unless  he  forgot  his 
fatigue  and  his  thirst  and  hunger,  and  called  all  of  his  reso- 
lution to  his  aid,  he  would  not  reach  camp  by  dark. 

The  long  afternoon  slipped  slowly  away,  and  the  twilight 
fell.  Booth  thought  that  he  had  his  bearings.  He  con- 
cluded, by  the  appearance  of  the  ridges,  that  the  creek 
where  they  had  their  camp  must  lay  about  four  miles  far- 
ther. He  remembered  that  a  man  can  walk  four  miles  in 
an  hour.  If  he  would  just  hurry,  he  might  reach  his  fire 
in  time  for  supper. 

So  he  tried  to  increase  his  pace.  And  this  was  his  first, 
really  tragic  mistake.  A  wise  mountaineer,  no  matter  where 
he  is,  rests  when  the  dark  comes  down. 

But  walking  in  the  mountains  is  not  like  walking  on  the 
plains.  In  an  hour  he  estimated  that  he  had  covered  two 
miles.  He  still  kept  on.  The  darkness  grew  deeper.  The 
stars  came  out. 

Soon  after  ten  Booth  had  a  painful  fall  over  a  rotten  log; 
and  as  he  lay  on  the  ground  the  truth  came  to  him.     One 


56      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

of  the  things  he  knew  was  that  only  a  tenderfoot  will 
try  to  find  his  way  through  the  mountains  in  the  darkness. 
There  are  too  many  precipices  to  fall  from — and  a  broken 
leg,  in  his  present  condition,  would  be  as  deadly  a  situation 
as  could  be  imagined.  But  the  truth  that  hit  him  hardest 
was  that  he  was  lost,  far  in  the  mountains,  and  alone. 

He  lifted  his  eyes,  intending  to  locate  the  Great  Dipper 
and  the  North  Star.  And  it  seemed  to  him  that  a  black 
shadow,  as  of  a  bird,  passed  close  above  his  head. 

Booth  camped  on  the  mountainside,  hungry  and  thirsty 
and  with  the  beginnings  of  terror  upon  him.  He  heard  the 
wolves  howling  from  the  ridges.  A  cougar  screamed  as 
it  made  its  kill.    He  felt  the  throb  and  pulse  of  the  forest  life. 

He  did  not  sleep  easily.  He  did  not  want  his  fire  to 
go  out;  and  that  meant  he  had  to  rise  every  hour  or  so 
and  put  on  fresh  fuel.  He  grew  cold  in  the  dawn  in  spite 
of  it. 

But  for  all  these  things,  he  felt  considerably  refreshed 
when  morning  broke.  And  at  once,  coolly  and  deliberately, 
he  tried  to  get  his  bearings.  He  determined  that  his  camp 
must  lie  some  five  miles  north.  Morning  grew  to  noon 
before  he  finally  came  to  the  conclusion  that  the  endless 
ridges  had  bewildered  him,  and  he  had  come  in  the  wrong 
direction. 

He  had  found  water,  a  spring  where  ferns  grew,  but  al- 
ready he  was  deeply  fatigued  from  exertion  and  hunger. 
He  read  his  compass,  again  and  again,  until  he  finally  knew 
his  general  directions  in  regard  to  camp  and  civilization. 
At  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  he  caught  sight  of  the 
white  tip  of  a  familiar  peak — a  mountain  that  he  could  not 
possibly  mistake.     But  he  was  on  the  wrong  side  of  it.    And 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  57 

in  a  single  instant  the  desperation  of  his  own  condition  stared 
him  in  the  face. 

He  was  endless  miles  from  his  own  camp.  He  did  not 
know  which  way  to  turn.  There  was  just  one  chance, — to 
stride  on  straight  west  toward  a  certain  mountain  river. 
He  knew  enough  of  the  geography  of  the  country  to  know 
that  if  he  went  far  enough,  thirty  miles  perhaps,  or  forty, 
he  would  reach  those  waters  at  last.  And  ranchers  lived 
along  the  river, — ranchers  with  venison  hanging  at  their 
doors.  Life  had  centered  down  to  simply  a  matter  of  find- 
ing food  enough  to  carry  him  those  weary  miles. 

Then  he  shook  his  fist  in  fury,  for  a  black  shadow  still 
skimmed  the  sky.  It  was  the  buzzard;  and  still  it  seemed 
to  be  watching  him. 

Only  the  buzzard's  eyes  followed  him  over  the  terrible 
miles  that  ensued.  They  seemed  to  pass  so  slowly.  The 
ridges  ever  lay  before  him,  each  one  a  torment  to  his  weary 
limbs.  Always  there  were  others,  when  each  was  crossed. 
Just  as  evening  fell  he  saw  his  first  game.  Two  gray  squir- 
rels romped  on  the  topmost  branches  of  a  pine. 

He  did  not  have  a  chance,  his  first  shot.  In  his  hunger, 
his  gun  fairly  leaped  to  his  shoulder.  He  did  not  even  take 
aim.  Then  he  cursed  himself.  He  had  thought  his  self- 
control  was  unconquerable.  He  took  better  aim  the  second 
time.  The  squirrel  he  fired  at  took  fright,  and  vanished 
into  the  foliage. 

Then  he  fired  at  the  second  squirrel,  and  again  he  missed. 
He  aimed  endlessly  the  fourth  shot.  He  knew  he  must  not 
miss  again.  The  body  of  one  squirrel  would  not  sustain 
him  all  the  way.    Already  his  strength  was  almost  gone. 

He  fired  again,  and  he  screamed  with  delight  when  the 
thing  fell  through  the  branches.     But  then  his  cry  cut  off 


58       The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

quickly  in  his  throat.  For  the  creature  was  simply  wounded. 
It  caught  itself  before  ever  it  reached  the  lower  limbs.  In 
an  instant  more  it  had  vanished.  Then,  with  bowed  head, 
the  man  went  on.  Two  cartridges  remained  to  bring  him 
through. 

In  one  of  the  dawns  that  followed  he  expended  these.  A 
deer  had  leaped  up  in  his  trail,  and  in  his  desperation  he 
had  fired  twice.  He  did  not  know  that  his  eyes  were 
already  burning  blindly,  and  fatigue  had  shattered  his  nerves 
beyond  all  hope  of  aiming  true.    Both  shots  were  clean  misses. 

He  stumbled  on — over  those  terrible  hills  that  seemed 
never  to  end.  He  threw  away  his  rifle.  It  only  burdened 
him  now.  The  game  he  saw  he  could  not  procure.  The 
buzzard  still  watched  him.  It  flew  lower  now.  It  seemed 
to  know,  grim  harbinger  of  death,  that  its  hour  of  triumph 
was  near.  Another  twilight  crept  gray  and  soft  over  the 
ridges. 

Then  Booth  found  himself  speaking  aloud.  Sometimes  he 
spoke  to  the  buzzard,  the  same  sentence  repeated  end- 
lessly. He  managed  to  choke  the  words  back  at  first.  But 
they  kept  coming  in  spite  of  him.  And  at  last,  as  the  long 
shadows  portended  night,  he  knew  that  his  trial  was  done. 

His  tortured  body  would  simply  on  longer  respond  to 
the  command  of  his  nerves.  His  stumbling  feet  no  longer 
held  him  up.  He  fell  down,  again  and  again,  and  each 
time  it  was  a  harder  battle  to  get  to  his  feet.  And  what 
did  it  matter,  anyway?  Pain  would  be  gone  from  his  limbs 
before  the  buzzards  came.  The  two  that  he  loved,  in  the 
valley  beneath,  would  wait  for  him  in  vain.  He  was  a 
tenderfoot  no  more,  but  he  had  paid  the  price.  There  was 
no  use  of  trying  further.  Only  food,  and  much  of  it,  would 
carry  him  to  his  destination.     His  rifle  was  gone,  and  the 


Never  Kill  a  Porcupine  59 

deer  and  squirrel  and  grouse  that  crossed  his  trail  could  not 
be  killed  with  his  hands.  He  had  lost,  just  as  many  men  had 
lost  before  him.  The  mountains  had  taught  their  lessons 
many  times  before.  So  the  thing  to  do  was  to  lie  still 
— and  go  to  sleep. 

"Forgive  me,  wife  and  little  child !"  he  spoke,  with  arms 
outstretched  toward  the  west  and  civilization.  "I  can't 
come  back.  I  can't  try  any  more.  There  isn't  a  chance — 
not  one " 

But  just  then  a  sound  in  the  brush  cut  his  words  short. 
He  turned  his  feverish  eyes.  Of  course  it  would  be  a  deer, 
— some  easy  mark  if  he  only  had  gun  and  cartridges  to 
kill  it  with.  It  would  be  just  some  forest  creature,  come  to 
mock  his  impotence.  The  step  came  nearer,  an  awkward, 
heavy  step.  Something  came  grunting,  sniffing  up  the  hill- 
side, something  that  the  buzzard  watched. 

Then  it  emerged  in  the  clearing  at  the  top  of  the  ridge. 
And  with  it  there  came  an  understanding  to  Chandos 
Booth  of  the  Indian's  words  at  the  beginning  of  the  hunt. 
It  was  Urson  who  had  come.  It  was  that  patient,  stupid 
forest  creature  that  never  seems  to  matter,  whose  place  in 
the  scheme  of  things  only  the  wisest  know. 

The  buzzard  was  to  be  cheated  after  all,  on  both  of  them. 
The  body  of  the  porcupine  was  never  to  be  torn  by  his 
hungry  beak.  Its  flesh  was  to  give  sustenance  to  the  man — 
to  strengthen  his  muscles  for  the  long  walk  back  to  civiliza- 
tion. He  was  nearly  thirty  pounds  of  fresh  meat,  the  only 
animal  in  the  forest  that  can  be  killed  by  a  starving  wanderer 
without  gun  or  cartridge.  He  had  fulfilled  the  destiny  for 
which  he  had  his  being,  the  fate  that  the  forest  laws  had 
written  for  him,  when  all  living  things  were  adjudged  their 
missions  and  their  meads. 


60      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

Chandos  Booth  was  not  the  first  man  that  the  porcupine 
has  saved  in  the  Oregon  mountains.  Particularly  when  their 
numbers  were  many,  a  tradition  grew  up  among  the  wisest 
of  the  mountain  men  that  they  were  never  to  be  killed  for 
sport,  solely  because  so  many  times  they  had  furnished  food 
to  human  beings,  starving  in  the  mountains. 

But  Booth  was  a  man  who  could  feel  gratitude.  He 
was  not  content  to  pass  on  the  tradition  to  the  hunters  that 
he  knew.  "Long  Tom,  it's  going  to  bear  good  fruit,"  he 
said,  the  last  night  before  he  left  the  mountains.  "I  have 
influence  in  this  State.  There  is  going  to  be  a  game  law 
passed,  protecting  the  porcupine.  Five  years  from  now  you'll 
see  'em  on  every  stump." 

But  the  Indian  only  grunted.  Such  things  as  game  laws 
were  beyond  his  ken.  His  dark  eyes  gazed  moodily  into  the 
circle  of  shadows  about  the  fire,  remembering  an  older  Ore- 
gon and  more  savage  days.  But  a  smile  flashed  at  the  white 
man's  face.  He  thought  of  a  buzzard  that  was  cheated,  and 
the  patient  Urson,  whose  death  would  prevent  extinction 
for  his  breed. 


JUNGLE  JUSTICE 

Sometimes  the  tent  seems  lonely  at  night. — From  a  Frontiers' 
man's  Diary. 

Just  where  the  long  shoulder  of  Mt.  McLaughlin  slopes 
down  to  the  high  plateaus,  a  long  chain  of  lakes  makes  a 
sort  of  giant's  necklace  of  sapphires  from  Fish  Lake  down 
into  Klamath.  You  can  hunt  all  day  without  finding  them 
on  the  map;  yet  they  are  notable  in  their  way.  Certain 
clans  of  the  tribes  of  water-fowl  make  them  a  rest  camp  on 
their  southern  migrations;  and  these  feathered  nomads  al- 
ways know  exactly  what  they  are  about.  Besides,  a  few 
bronzed  old  sportsmen,  quiet-eyed  and  cool-nerved  and  with  a 
perfect  knowledge  of  what  is  worth  while  in  the  world,  come 
from  long  distances  to  cast  flies  upon  their  waters.  The 
lake  trout  therein  are  large  and  fight  furiously  until  the  land- 
ing net  slides  beneath  them. 

It  is  impossible  to  find  the  lakes  on  the  map;  and  they 
are  not  particularly  easy  to  find  in  an  automobile.  One  has 
to  go  to  the  great  Northwest  of  the  United  States,  a  rather 
ample  space  that  fills  up  all  the  country  between  California 
and  Canada,  and  take  the  mountain  road  that  curls  up 
toward  McLaughlin.  It  is  best  not  to  get  off  the  road,  for 
one  might  find  himself  anywhere  from  the  bottom  of  a  preci- 
pice to  the  other  side  of  the  Umpqua  divide,  a  rugged  eter- 
nity wherein  even  the  oldest  mountaineers  do  not  care  to  be 
lost.  McLaughlin  is  notable  too,  although  it  isn't  one  of 
the  greatest  of  western  mountains.    It  is  snow-covered,  how- 


62       The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

ever,  and  wonderfully  symmetrical ;  and  it  is  one  of  the  great 
family  of  high  peaks  that  keep  a  sort  of  outpost  guard 
all  along  the  western  coast.  McLaughlin,  which  some 
people  call  Mt.  Pitt,  has  charge  of  the  post  between  Mt. 
Shasta,  to  the  south,  and  the  Three  Sisters  to  the  north — 
and  all  the  Government  property  in  view! 

Fish  Lake  is  the  first  of  the  chain,  and  perhaps  less  inter- 
esting than  the  others.  Then  comes  sleepy,  creepy  old  Lake- 
of-the- Woods.  Buck  Lake  is  the  third;  and  timber  grows 
almost  down  to  the  water's  edge  at  Buck  Lake.  And  since 
Woof  and  his  mother  were  born  clumsy,  it  was  quite  im- 
possible for  them  to  go  down  and  get  a  drink  without 
disturbing  every  one  in  the  vicinity.  Woof  made  more  noise 
going  through  a  half-mile  of  timber  than  lythe  Whisperfoot 
made  in  his  whole  life. 

But  of  course  Whisperfoot  was  a  cougar,  whose  very  life 
depended  on  being  able  to  slide  through  the  forest  like 
a  puff  from  Long  Tom's  pipe.  He  had  cushions  on  his  feet, 
and  more  marvelous  muscle  control  than  any  physical- 
culture  expert  in  the  world.  A  single  broken  twig,  a 
rustle  of  a  leaf  or  a  stir  of  a  pebble  would  transform  the 
feeding  deer  into  flying  brown  meteors  that  no  cougar  could 
possibly  catch.  But  noise  didn't  matter  to  Woof.  He 
rather  liked  it.  The  only  game  he  sought  was  an  occasional 
beetle  under  a  log;  and  a  beetle  won't  run  from  an  avalanche. 
For  Woof  was  simply  a  fuzzy,  fat  little  black-bear  cub,  with 
no  hunting  blood  in  his  veins. 

His  lean  mother  led  him  down  through  the  thick  brush; 
and  every  one  on  the  lake  had  his  head  up  to  see  them  come. 
Life  itself,  in  the  forests,  depends  on  always  being  alert. 
The  forest  creatures  have  no  officers  of  the  law ;  or  no  battle- 
ships on  the  sea  or  cannon  in  the  forts  to  guard  them.    They 


Jungle  Justice  63 

have  to  depend  on  their  own  senses,  every  minute  of  every 
hour.  The  step  in  the  brush  might  be  Woof,  or  it  might  be 
the  tramp  of  some  human  hunter,  trying  to  go  silently.  So 
when  finally  the  brush  parted  at  the  lake  shore,  the  flock  of 
geese  that  had  been  feeding  at  the  water's  edge  were  all 
poised  for  flight.  But  at  once  they  settled  back  with  little 
squawks  of  content.  Not  even  the  teal  in  the  shallows 
were  afraid  of  Woof. 

This  was  the  first  time  the  cub  had  seen  the  place.  He 
sat  up,  pointed  his  ears,  and  blinked  with  delight.  He 
began  to  wonder  if  he  could  possibly  catch  the  waddling 
geese  on  the  lake  margin  unknowing  that  months  were  to 
pass  before  he  would  finally  conclude  that  he  couldn't.  A 
trout,  splashing  from  the  water,  suggested  all  sorts  of  pleas- 
ing possibilities;  and  a  horned  buck,  drinking  a  short  dis- 
tance down  the  shore,  excited  his  bump  of  curiosity  beyond 
restraint.  Woof  was  born  with  more  curiosity  than  he  could 
ever  hope  to  satisfy.  But  just  then,  before  he  was  half 
done  looking,  his  mother  cuffed  him  from  behind  and  sent 
him  on  his  head  in  the  sands.  She  meant  by  this  that  he  was 
to  get  his  drink  and  go. 

But  Woof  delayed  just  as  long  as  he  could.  He  drank 
very  slowly  and  pretended  to  have  difficulty  in  finding  clean, 
unroiled  water.  He  fell  down  two  or  three  times,  and 
chased  a  gopher  snake  into  the  thickets,  and  bumped  his 
nose  on  a  sharp  rock,  and  tumbled  headfirst  into  the  water 
and  had  many  other  adventures  in  even  less  time  than  a 
man  cub  could  have  done  the  same.  And  then — at  the  edge 
of  the  little  inlet  in  the  sand — he  ran  smack  into  the  greatest 
find  of  his  young  life. 

It  was  a  small  trout,  newly  killed,  lying  in  the  sand.  His 
mother  was  too  far  ahead  to  see  it.    Nine  chances  out  of  ten 


64      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

there  would  have  been  a  strangeness  and  a  smell  about  it 
that  would  have  caused  her  to  investigate  it  very  carefully 
before  she  laid  on  paws.  Woof's  mother,  awkward  and 
fumbling  though  she  was,  knew  considerable  of  the  ways 
of  men.  But  little  Woof  was  wholly  without  suspicion.  He 
gave  a  cry  of  pleasure  and  stretched  out  a  paw. 

There  was  a  clang  of  metal,  a  terrifying  leap  and  stir  in 
the  sand;  and  then  his  pleasure  sound  changed  to  a  wail  of 
fright  and  pain.  The  waterfowl  leaped  in  the  air,  poised 
and  dropped  again.  His  mother  whirled,  faster  than  the 
forest  people  had  ever  seen  her  move  before,  and  charged 
back  with  a  roar  of  anger.  The  mother  black  bear  is  as 
amiable  and  gentle  a  creature  as  ranges  the  forest;  but  she 
is  not  pleasant  to  meet  in  defense  of  her  cub.  It  seemed  to 
the  watching  forest  creatures  that  she  covered  the  forty  paces 
in  the  time  that  a  teal  takes  to  leap  from  the  water. 

But  when  she  got  back  to  her  squealing  cub,  the  only  foe 
she  could  see  was  a  steel  something  that  the  cub  pulled 
about  in  the  sand.  The  jaws  of  it  were  pinched  tightly 
on  the  very  tips  of  her  son's  toes.  Woof  had  walked  squarely 
into  one  of  Dong  Tom's  traps. 

It  is  likely  that  old  Black-tail,  standing  knee-deep  in  the 
cool  water,  heard  the  sound  first.  He  liked  to  stand  that 
way.  The  August  sun  had  parched  the  woods  dry,  and  even 
the  heavy  buckbush  no  longer  afforded  a  cool  retreat  during 
the  heat  of  the  day.  Black-tail's  very  life  depended  on 
hearing  sounds  quickly  and  surely, — the  tiniest  prick  of  sound 
through  a  half-mile  of  forest.  His  ears  were  trained  to 
listen  for  the  fall  of  the  cougar's  feet  on  the  forest  leaves,  and 
ears  that  can  hear  that,  can  hear  the  death  cry  of  an  insect 
in  the  air. 


Jungle  Justice  65 

He  raised  his  antlered  head  and  stood  motionless.  A 
hush  fell  over  the  lake.  The  long  necks  of  the  geese  came 
up,  and  a  mink  slid  softly  into  the  water.  Woof's  mother 
paused  for  an  instant  beside  her  cub,  then  turned  anxious  eyes 
toward  the  thickets  behind  her. 

The  sound  that  reached  them  would  have  gone  unnoticed 
by  human  ears.  Some  one  was  crossing  to  the  lake  through 
brush,  some  one  who  knew  how  to  walk  with  silence.  Only 
the  dry  foliage  permitted  them  to  hear  at  all.  Black-tail 
knew  perfectly  that  few  indeed  of  his  arch  enemies,  the 
mountain  men  that  had  farms  in  the  little  valleys,  were  able 
to  walk  so  quietly.  The  sound  grew  louder;  and  Black-tail 
made  the  shore  in  a  single  leap.  He  did  not  pause  on  the 
bank.  The  brush  seemed  to  leap  to  cover  and  close  behind 
him. 

The  wild  geese  do  not  hear  particularly  well;  but  their 
eyes  are  among  the  keenest  in  the  animal  world.  They 
caught  a  glimpse  of  a  stealing  figure  in  the  thickets ;  and  they 
sprang  up  with  a  rumble  and  crash  of  wings.  The  she-bear 
waited  but  an  instant  more.  She  called  once  to  her  cub, 
then  loped  back  into  the  brush.  But  she  had  no  intention  of 
deserting  her  offspring  for  good.  Such  isn't  the  way  of 
mothers.  She  would  simply  wait  until  this  danger  had 
passed.  Then  Long  Tom,  the  trapper  of  the  lake  region, 
stepped  on  the  shore. 

Black-tail  might  have  congratulated  himself  that  he  got 
out  in  time.  Long  Tom  carried  a  rifle,  and  he  had  a  way  of 
glancing  for  an  instant  down  its  barrel  that  was  simply 
death  for  any  one  at  the  other  end.  A  rifle  is  not  the  gun 
usually  used  for  hunting  waterfowl,  but  the  geese  had  a 
right  to  feel  self-congratulatory  too.     Long  Tom  had  been 


66      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

known  to  do  unexpected  things  with  the  little  3030  caliber 
in  the  hollow  of  his  arm. 

The  other  mountaineers  missed  sometimes.  Long  Tom 
never  did.  They  stumbled  and  broke  twigs  and  fell  over 
stumps  when  they  went  through  the  forest.  Long  Tom 
slipped  through  like  a  mid-afternoon  wind.  They  had 
houses;  Long  Tom's  lair  was  either  a  hasty  lean-to,  or  a 
white-cornered  thing  that  he  stuck  up  on  poles.  They  had 
white  skins ;  Long  Tom's  was  curiously  dark. 

The  whole  secret  lay  in  the  fact  that  Long  Tom  was  an 
Indian.  He  was  not  the  kind  of  Indian  that  welfare  workers 
see  on  the  reservations.  The  latter  live  in  houses  and  wear 
gay  clothes;  and  some  of  them  have  automobiles  and  bad 
habits.  It  was  simply  that  when  civilization  was  passed 
around,  Long  Tom  missed  his  portion.  He  didn't  even  own 
a  last  name,  but  was  known  throughout  a  territory  as  big  as 
the  State  of  New  Jersey  simply  as  Long  Tom,  with  accent 
on  the  Long.  Though  he  no  longer  wore  feathers  and  paint, 
though  occasionally  he  took  his  furs  down  and  traded  them 
for  supplies,  he  was  just  as  much  a  wild  Indian  as  he  ever 
was,  just  as  much  a  native  of  the  forest  as  the  little  black  cub 
in  his  pathway. 

He  came  up  close,  and  a  curiously  bright,  flashing  smile 
lingered  for  an  instant  on  his  dusky  face.  "Ugh!"  he 
exclaimed. 

Since  the  aborigines  first  bathed  in  the  crimson  snow  on 
the  top  of  Mt.  McLaughlin  at  sunset  and  thereby  became 
redskins,  they  have  said  "Ugh!"  at  anything  that  surprised 
them.  Even  tame  Indians  say  it  yet.  No  one  knows  exactly 
what  it  means — any  more  than  any  one  knows  what  a  white- 
skin  means  when  he  says  "Geewhillikins!"     He  stole  one 


Jungle  Justice  67 

glance  at  the  cub's  paw,  seeing  that  only  the  tips  of  its  toes 
held  it  in  the  trap.     "Ugh!"  he  said  again. 

"Woof!"  replied  the  cub. 

"So  that  is  your  name?"  the  Indian  asked  in  the  vernacu- 
lar.   "Woof!" 

"Woof!"  the  cub  barked  again,  as  if  reassuring  him  on 
this  point.    Then  it  crawled  clear  out  to  the  end  of  its  chain. 

"Woof"  comes  as  near  the  usual  articulation  of  a  black 
bear  as  the  language  can  express.  Of  course  he  has  other 
sounds  too,  whimpers  and  barks  and  whines  and  growls,  but 
nine  times  out  of  ten  he  will  say  "Woof,"  and  let  it  go  at 
that.  It  means  "What  is  that?"  and  "I'm  hungry,"  and 
"Go  away,"  and  "I'm  scared,"  and  one  hundred  other  things. 
The  little  cub  said  it  several  times  more ;  and  then — 

The  word  can  be  said  in  several  tones  of  voice.  The  cub 
used  a  frightened  tone;  and  because  a  cub  is  never  so  fright- 
ened but  that  he  is  somewhat  curious  as  well,  a  rather  ques- 
tioning tone  too.  But  just  then  Long  Tom  heard  the  same 
sound,  only  about  one  hundred  times  louder,  just  behind  him. 
And  this  time  it  was  neither  afraid  nor  questioning. 

"Woof!"  It  was  simply  an  explosion  of  sound,  a  kind 
of  cross  between  a  roar  and  a  bark.  Long  Tom  did  not 
have  the  unsteady  nerves  of  white  men,  and  he  did  not 
jump  at  all.  He  simply  whirled,  and  the  rifle  leaped  like  a 
streak  of  light  to  his  shoulder.  No  human  eyes  could  have 
traced  its  motion.  It  was  cocked  and  ready  by  the  time 
his  head  was  bent  to  see  along  the  barrel.  The  thickets 
parted,  and  a  black  form  lunged  through.  In  a  desperate 
effort  to  protect  her  cub,  the  she-bear  charged  full  in  his  face. 

Ordinarily  a  black  bear  is  the  most  timid  and  good-natured 
creature  that  can  be  imagined.  It  would  sooner  charge  a  full 
wolf  pack  in  winter  than  a  man.    And  under  ordinary  con- 


68      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

ditions  Long  Tom  would  have  rather  wasted  his  shells  on  a 
porcupine  than  on  a  black  bear.  No  one  knew  better  than  he 
what  harmless,  amiable  creatures  they  were.  But  in  one 
case,  the  she-bear  obeyed  a  voice  that  was  as  real  as  life 
itself,  as  inexorable  as  the  night  falling  when  the  day  is  done. 
It  was  the  instinct  to  protect  her  offspring, — that  deep-seated 
impulse  that  alone  has  made  possible  the  perpetuation  of 
life.  And  in  the  other,  it  was  simply  a  matter  of  self- 
preservation.    There  was  simply  no  other  choice. 

The  bear  fell  just  at  the  edge  of  the  brush,  softly  and 
silently  and  without  pain.  The  man  crept  toward  it,  with 
ready  weapon.  But  it  did  not  stir  again.  Then  he  turned 
back  to  the  cub,  whining  in  the  trap. 

"Poor  little  one!"  he  said  in  his  own  tongue, — a  tongue 
more  gentle  than  most  people  believe.  "Poor  little  mother- 
less! I  have  no  furry  coat  to  warm  you,  and  no  milk  in 
my  hard  breasts.  But  I  will  do  my  best,  smallest!  And 
perhaps  you  will  find  me  not  so  bad  a  father!" 

For  Long  Tom  had  that  sense  of  direct,  elementary  justice 
that  has  long  been  recognized  as  a  trait  among  the  Indians. 
He  had  slain  Woof's  mother;  and  by  the  laws  that  the 
glaciers  engraved  on  the  mountainsides,  Long  Tom  must 
needs  watch  over  the  cub  until  it  was  able  to  take  care  of 
itself. 

The  task  of  being  mother  of  little  Woof  was  a  delight  al- 
most from  the  first.  He  had  been  well  weaned  the  previous 
month ;  and  this  simplified  matters  immensely.  A  wet  nurse 
would  have  been  hard  to  find  in  the  Lake  region.  Long  Tom 
took  him  to  his  shelter,  and  that  night  they  had  a  long  talk 
together  as  the  stars  popped  one  by  one  out  of  the  gray 
evening  sky. 

Long  Tom  did  most  of  the  talking;  what  he  said  is  for- 


Jungle  Justice  69 

ever  locked  in  the  dark  hearts  of  the  great  pines  that  lifted 
their  heads  over  his  rude  hut;  and  these  grave  companions 
are  never  tale  bearers.  He  was  a  lonely  man,  and  most 
of  his  race  had  long  since  departed  to  a  hunting  ground 
where  there  are  no  such  things  as  titles  of  land,  and  hunting 
licenses,  and  trespass  signs.  The  little  cub  licked  his  hand 
with  a  warm  tongue  and  cuddled  in  the  hollow  of  his  arm. 
And  something  seemed  to  change  and  grow  warm  deep  down 
in  this  strong  man's  strong  heart. 

It  is  not  often  that  an  Indian  smiles;  but  Long  Tom 
smiled  then.  If  indeed  the  forest  folk  were  watching 
through  the  windows,  as  legend  says  they  do,  they  must  have 
wondered  at  it.  It  was  a  peculiar  upward  curve  of  the 
thin,  firm  lips,  and  a  sudden  light  in  the  straight,  dark  eyes. 

He  talked  in  his  own  tongue, — a  tongue  since  bastardized 
and  weakened.  And  the  little  cub  had  but  one  reply, — a 
little  "Woof"  of  contentment  and  peace. 

Truly,  Woof  grew  lonely  before  the  night  was  done. 
The  hard  muscles  under  the  blanket  were  not  like  the  furry 
coat  of  his  mother.  He  missed  the  warm  tongue,  the  rough 
caresses.  He  was  a  little  afraid,  too,  when  the  smells  and 
the  sounds  of  the  mountain  night  stole  in  through  the  open- 
ing in  the  lean-to.  But  in  the  morning  there  were  fried 
potatoes  wet  with  canned  milk,  and  a  lump  of  wild  honey, 
and  a  big,  fat  flap-jack  fried  solely  for  his  use;  and  these 
things  went  a  long  way  toward  effacing  the  memory  of  his 
mother.    After  a  digestive  nap,  he  was  quite  ready  to  romp. 

He  followed  the  tall  form  around  the  line  of  traps;  and 
Long  Tom  was  even  a  better  provider  than  his  late  mother. 
He  had  a  pleasant  way  of  upsetting  rotten  logs  with  one 
shove  of  his  broad  shoulders,  and  exposing  whole  armies 
of  the  most  tempting  beetles  and  slugs.     Then  he  would 


70      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

stand  back  and  grunt  as  little  Woof  would  tumble  all  over 
himself  trying  to  lick  them  all  up  with  his  red  tongue. 
And  just  as  evening  came  down,  they  encountered  a  won- 
derful thicket  of  the  biggest,  juicest  huckleberries  that  hungry 
bear  ever  spied  before. 

Inside  of  a  week,  Woof  was  firm  in  the  belief  that  Long 
Tom  was  his  rightful  and  legitimate  parent.  He  had  for- 
gotten his  real  mother  that  lay  so  still  beside  the  lake.  The 
two  would  sit  together  before  the  lean-to  in  the  evenings, 
and  Long  Tom's  pipe  would  glow,  and  little  Woof  would 
grunt  and  whisper  and  beg  for  caresses,  and  play  clumsy, 
romping  games  with  his  own  shadow;  and  then  they  would 
go  to  sleep  under  the  same  coverlet. 

And  soon  they  needed  a  bigger  blanket.  Little  Woof 
was  well  fed  and  happy,  and  even  the  summer  flowers, 
that  know  they  have  to  live  a  whole  life  of  bud  and  leaf 
and  blossom  and  seed  between  one  winter's  snow  and  an- 
other's, did  not  grow  as  fast  as  he.  His  joy  in  the  fact  was 
nothing  compared  to  Long  Tom's.  By  now  the  latter  was 
convinced  that  he  owned  the  prize  bear  in  the  whole  wide 
world;  and  he  rejoiced  in  every  added  ounce  of  fur  and 
muscle. 

Life  was  good,  after  all.  As  the  long  fall  drew  to 
winter,  and  the  various  berries  grew  ripe  and  rich,  and  the 
fallen  leaves  began  to  shuffle  beneath  his  clumsy  feet,  just 
to  live  and  breathe  became  a  delight.  And  when  the  night 
brought  its  age-old  return  of  mystery, — smells  pungent  and 
strange,  and  the  little,  hushed  noises  of  the  wilderness, 
he  would  simply  tingle  with  rapture.  He  liked  the  long, 
hard  walks  with  his  master,  the  meals  under  the  pines,  the 
hours  of  romping  and  the  caress  of  the  hard  hand.  It  was 
a  curious  fact  that  the  days  seemed  to  pass  faster  for  Long 


Jungle  Justice  71 

Tom,  too.  It  is  not  good  for  a  man  to  live  alone  in  the 
still  hills,  and  little  Woof  was  company  of  the  rarest.  The 
man  was  never  quite  sure  what  he  was  going  to  do  next. 
He  only  knew  that  it  would  be  something  entirely  unlooked- 
for  and  original. 

Long  Tom  permitted  him  the  fullest  freedom.  After 
the  first  week  the  hastily  fabricated  collar  and  leash  were 
taken  off  for  good.  Long  Tom,  free  as  the  eagles  that  now 
and  then  skimmed  down  from  Eagle  Ridge,  knew  something 
of  the  value  of  liberty.  Woof  was  of  a  free  people,  even 
as  he  himself,  and  his  eternal  sense  of  justice  prevented  him 
from  inflicting  bonds  on  his  pet.  The  cub  was  free  to  go 
at  all  times,  yet  he  seemed  to  prefer  to  remain.  And  really 
he  had  all  the  joys  of  a  completely  wild  bear  with  none  of 
the  disadvantages.  There  was  nothing  tame  about  the  wild, 
nomadic  life  they  led  from  rim  to  rim  of  the  Lake  region. 

Woof  began  to  be  glad  that  he  did  not  face  the  winter 
alone.  Somehow,  the  sight  of  all  the  fallen  leaves,  and 
the  dying  flowers,  and  the  feel  of  a  strange  heaviness  in  the 
air,  began  to  make  him  afraid.  Even  the  leaves  looked 
strange  and  dark,  and  the  grass  got  tawny,  and  the  wind 
came  up  cold  in  the  dawns.  He  began  to  be  glad  of  the 
tall,  strong  body  that  lay  beside  him  under  the  coverlet. 
By  now  the  flight  of  the  waterfowl  had  begun  in  earnest; 
and  the  air  was  choked  with  the  sad  cry  of  the  wild  geese. 
The  velvet  was  all  gone  from  the  horns  of  the  great  buck 
deer,  and  the  deer  themselves  seemed  to  be  filled  with  frenzy 
and  madness;  it  was  mating  time  among  the  black-tails. 
And  one  night  the  snow  fell  over  the  hills. 

It  vanished  soon  in  the  morning;  but  for  all  that,  it 
marked  the  change  in  the  seasons.    Winter  had  come. 

Soon  after  this  Woof  beheld  the  slow  descent  of  all  the 


72      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

forest  people  from  the  lake  regions  to  the  brown  foothills 
below.  Even  the  rodents  and  the  poison-folk  were  crawling 
away  where  his  groping  paw  could  not  find  them.  One 
night,  when  he  wanted  Long  Tom  to  play  with  him,  he 
saw  that  his  master  was  busy  tearing  down  the  little  shelter. 

"I'm  going  to  the  lower  foothills,"  the  man  explained. 
"You'd  freeze  your  nose  off  if  we  tried  to  winter  here." 

For  Long  Tom  had  no  deeds  of  land  or  cabin  of  logs 
to  keep  him  in  one  place.  He  moved  with  the  seasons, 
and  his  trail  was  the  trail  of  the  deer, — down  in  fall  and 
up  in  spring. 

On  the  way  they  met  Jim  Gibbs,  a  trapper  that  lived 
in  the  Fish  Lake  region.  Neither  of  them  particularly 
cared  about  him.  Long  Tom,  a  just  man  to  the  last  drop 
in  his  veins,  had  always  tried  to  overcome  the  feeling  of 
distrust  that  he  had  for  him;  and  his  greeting  was  friendly. 
He  tried  to  disregard  the  fact  that  more  than  once  Gibbs 
had  broken  the  trapper's  law  and  trespassed  on  Long  Tom's 
own  trapping  ground.  But  of  course  Gibbs  was  a  white 
man,  and  he  did  not  understand  the  law  of  trap  and  tribe. 

But  little  Woof  felt  no  restraining  influences.  He  knew 
little  of  manners  and  less  of  conventions  that  make  the  re- 
lations of  human  beings  so  inexplicable  to  the  forest  folk, 
and  he  had  no  principles  whatever  except  fairness  to  his 
master  and  self-preservation;  so  he  made  no  effort  at  all 
to  be  polite  to  Gibbs.  He  didn't  like  the  way  Gibbs  looked 
at  him.  It  was  the  same  look  that  had  burned  from  the 
eyes  of  the  cougar,  one  night  when  it  had  slain  a  deer 
in  the  Dark  Glen. 

So  Woof  didn't  look  twice  at  Gibbs.  But  he  was  very 
much  interested  indeed  in  the  pet  that  followed  at  Gibbs' 
heels.     He  had  to  look  a  long  time  before  he  could  make 


Jungle  Justice  73 

him  out;  and  then  concluded  that  he  must  be  a  strange  kind 
of  bear  cub. 

Gibbs'  pet  was  interested  too;  and  he  also  fell  to  con- 
jecturing what  manner  of  creature  this  little,  black,  fuzzy, 
four-legged  beast  might  be.  And  equally  erroneously,  he 
concluded  that  he  must  be  some  new  kind  of  dog.  They 
came  up  to  make  friends. 

Woof  immediately  sat  down.  When  he  was  particularly 
interested,  he  always  sat  down.  And  the  little  dog  could 
not  understand  this  action  at  all.  He  was  quite  unable  to 
sit  down  in  just  this  way  himself,  and  the  whole  proceed- 
ing mystified  him  beyond  words.  But  taking  heart,  he 
came  close  and  tried  to  introduce  himself  in  the  way  ac- 
cepted among  dogs. 

He  wasn't  quite  sure  what  happened  after  that.  He  was 
quite  vividly  aware  that  the  bear  had  reached  down  and 
cuffed  him — once  with  each  paw — and  rolled  him  over  back- 
wards. And  not  till  then,  when  he  heard  the  two  men  bel- 
lowing with  laughter,  did  he  conclude  that  he  must  have 
been  mistaken  in  thinking  Woof  a  dog.  Dogs,  he  well  knew, 
had  better  manners. 

They  parted  soon,  and  Long  Tom  headed  the  way  down 
the  long  trail.  He  was  quite  unaware  that  Gibbs  looked 
after  him  until  a  shoulder  of  the  hill  hid  him  from  sight 
— an  odd  look  of  speculation  and  greed  on  his  heavy  face. 

Hibernating  in  the  winter  is  simply  a  matter  of  the  lesser 
of  two  evils  with  the  bears.  When  life  is  good  and  their 
stomachs  full,  three  months  of  sleep  doesn't  appeal  to  them 
at  all.  Life  is  too  short,  and  the  fun  of  living  much  too 
keen  for  a  happy  bear  to  do  this  sort  of  thing  from  choice. 
They  would  much  rather  be  prowling  about  on  the  hill- 


74      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

sides,  grunting  at  the  deer,  and  unearthing  beetles,  and 
shuffling  leaves  and  scratching  fleas. 

But  there  is  no  other  alternative.  The  deer  all  go  down 
to  the  foothills  in  winter.  The  beetles  bury  under  the 
ground,  and  the  shuffling  leaves  are  all  covered  with  snow. 
There  aren't  even  any  fleas  left  to  scratch.  The  bears  are 
sociable  animals,  and  they  don't  like  to  have  the  big  dead 
mountains  all  to  themselves.  Moreover,  the  business  of 
making  a  living  becomes  extremely  difficult.  Even  the 
acorns  are  snow-covered.  So  they  simply  make  the  best  of 
a  bad  job,  find  some  cozy  nook  or  rocky  cavern  and  sleep 
till  spring. 

In  this  regard  they  are  entire  different  from  their  su- 
periors, the  men  that  come  up  from  the  valleys  to  hunt. 
When  the  latter  are  out  of  food  and  lost  from  their  own 
kind,  or  when  a  blizzard  suddenly  breaks  down  upon  them 
like  a  scourge,  they  do  not  make  a  snug  snow-house  and  rest 
till  the  danger  is  past.  They  are  more  likely  to  start  run- 
ning— in  a  perfect  circle.  And  soon  after  this  search  parties 
scour  the  hills  for  the  form  of  something  huddled  and 
strange  in  a  snowdrift. 

Woof  had  a  strong,  tall  man  to  look  after  him;  so  the 
thought  of  hibernating  did  not  even  enter  his  head.  The  two 
spent  the  winter  on  the  lower  foothills — lovely,  green  slopes 
where  the  snow  only  came  at  long  intervals  and  melted 
quickly.  He  liked  the  cold  dawns,  the  tiring  tramps 
over  the  trap  lines,  the  wind  and  the  winter  stars.  He 
liked  to  climb  to  the  top  of  a  great  pine  and  have  a  de- 
licious swinging  game  all  by  himself.  And  by  now  he  had 
learned  most  of  the  lessons  that  the  wild  bears  know, — 
lessons  in   bread-winning  to  sustain  him   if   anything  ever 


Jungle  Justice  75 

happened  to  Long  Tom.  Things  do  happen  to  people,  quite 
often,  in  the  mountains. 

Among  other  things,  Woof  learned  to  be  an  expert  fisher- 
man. Bears  do  not  use  hook  and  line.  They  crawl  out 
into  the  riffles  and  simply  wait.  The  art  in  it  lies  in  being 
able  to  stand  perfectly  still,  so  not  even  a  shadow  flickers 
on  the  water.  The  salmon  do  not  have  very  sharp  eyes. 
The  black  shape  in  the  shallows,  unmoving,  does  not  even  at- 
tract their  attention.  They  swim  on,  in  their  endless  up- 
stream journey.  The  Indians  say  that  the  secret  of  life  is 
to  be  seen  in  the  lives  of  the  salmon, — a  long  climb  until 
death !  All  at  once  something  that  is  too  fast  for  the  human 
eye  to  follow  scoops  down  at  them.  Curved  claws  catch 
them  and  hurl  them  to  the  bank.  And  Woof,  with  a  ten- 
pound  steelhead  trout  in  his  stomach,  was  the  happiest  crea- 
ture alive. 

But  Woof  preferred  berries  and  acorns  and  vegetables. 
In  the  way  of  meat,  he  liked  beetles  and  slugs  and  an  oc- 
casional toad.  It  was  always  an  exciting  game  to  get  into 
Long  Tom's  grub  box,  and  one  day  he  got  his  head  caught 
in  it.  This  was  circumstantial  evidence  that  even  such  a 
just  Indian  as  Long  Tom  could  not  question.  So  he  soberly 
cut  a  switch  and  inflicted  it  when  Woof  was  helpless. 

Spring  came  at  last;  and  Woof  was  a  yearling.  They 
headed  together  back  into  the  higher  hills.  Spring  drew 
to  summer,  and  life  was  perfect  beyond  all  dreams.  In  the 
last  days  of  August  a  man  on  horseback  brought  a  letter 
to  Long  Tom. 

"You  will  have  to  read  it  to  me,"  Long  Tom  told  him. 

With  an  apprehensive  eye  on  the  bear,  the  white  man  read 
the  letter.  It  was  from  the  court  in  the  valley  below,  and 
it  turned  out  to  be  a  command  for  Long  Tom  to  leave 


76      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

his  mountain  home  for  a  week  and  attend  to  some  legal 
business.  Because  Long  Tom  was  an  Indian,  the  Govern- 
ment felt  it  had  to  look  after  him. 

"But  what  shall  I  do  with  Woof?"  he  asked  in  the  ver- 
nacular. 

The  only  word  that  the  white  man  caught  was  the  last  one, 
but  he  interpreted  amazingly  well.  He  hadn't  even  known 
that  the  bear's  name  was  Woof.  Perhaps  he  was  an  im- 
aginative man,  or  perhaps  he  was  simply  thinking  about  the 
bear  all  the  time.     For  his  answer  came  pat. 

"Take  him  with  you,  and  sell  him  to  the  circus  that  is 
coming  through  the  valley  in  three  days." 

Long  Tom  didn't  consider  this  suggestion  worthy  of  a 
reply.  At  once  he  began  to  make  preparations  for  de- 
parture. He  got  out  Woof's  collar  and  chain,  and  tied 
him  securely  to  a  little  pine  tree  in  front  of  the  tent. 
"Worthless!"  he  said  gently,  coming  back  to  take  the  bear's 
muzzle  in  his  palm.  "Go  back,  furry  robber  of  grub  boxes. 
Your  master  is  called  away  to  the  white  man's  court  be- 
low; and  you,  little  wicked,  must  stay  here.  But  I  will 
return  soon.  And  then,  Woof,  you  and  I  will  see  what 
country  lies  about  Squaw  Lake." 

If  Woof  could  have  understood,  his  little  brown  eyes 
would  have  glittered  with  delight.  He  loved  strange  re- 
gions and  new  rivers,  long  climbs  to  unknown  peaks,  and 
stealing  searches  through  the  unsurveyed.  But  he  howled 
mournfully  when  Long  Tom  vanished  down  the  trail. 

On  his  way  down,  Long  Tom  made  a  satisfactory  ar- 
rangement with  Jim  Gibbs, — by  which,  for  a  certain  beaver 
skin,  Gibbs  was  to  care  for  Woof  during  the  Indian's  ab- 
sence.    He  was  to  come  in  the  morning  and  make  him  a 


Jungle  Justice  77 

flapjack,  and  in  the  afternoon  take  him  for  an  hour's  ramble 
through  the  berry  thickets. 

"So  you're  goin'  for  a  whole  week?"  Gibbs  murmured,, 
when  their  talk  was  done.  He  eyes  seemed  to  grow  spec- 
ulative, then  wandered  to  an  empty  whisky  flask  on 
his  grub  box.  Gibbs  knew  perfectly  that  many  things  could 
be  accomplished  in  a  week. 

In  reality  the  work  of  the  court  took  ten  days.  They 
seemed  like  ten  months  to  Long  Tom.  He  couldn't  sleep 
in  the  hotel  bed  at  all,  for  the  first  few  nights.  He  did 
manage  to  attain  some  rest  in  the  grass  of  the  park.  On 
the  eleventh  day  he  did  not  even  wait  for  dawn,  to  start 
back  into  the  hills.  And  he  rejoiced  at  every  mile  that 
streamed  beneath  him. 

Evening  was  falling  when  at  last  Long  Tom  came  in 
sight  of  his  own  tent.  But  at  the  first  glance  something 
seemed  changed  about  it.  It  did  seem  so  curiously  silent 
and  deserted.  He  could  not  understand  at  first.  Why  was 
Woof  not  roaring  a  welcome  to  his  sound  and  smell  on  the 
wind?  He  sprinted  the  last  hundred  yards — and  then  he 
stopped  dead  in  his  tracks. 

Woof  was  gone.  The  chain  was  broken  off  squarely,  a 
few  inches  from  the  tree. 

"Maybe  Gibbs  has  got  him,"  the  Indian  muttered. 
"Maybe  he's  feeding  him  in  the  thickets."  Yet  he  knew 
that  he  lied  as  he  said  it.  Gibbs  would  not  have  broken 
the  chain  to  lead  the  bear  to  the  berry  fields.  He  started 
back,  running,  toward  Gibbs'  cabin. 

He  met  the  man  at  the  river,  his  rifle  in  the  hollow 
of  his  arm.  Gibbs  wore  a  new  pair  of  boots;  his  eyes  were 
bloodshot  and  strange.  His  hip  bulged  with  a  large  flask, 
and  it  was  almost  empty,  too. 


78      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

"He  was  there  this  morning,"  Gibbs  told  him  when  he 
had  heard  the  story.  "I  tended  him  more'n  a  week,  for  the 
beaver  skin  you  promised.  He  must  have  broken  his  chain 
and  went  wild." 

Soon  after  this  the  Indian  went  alone  back  to  his  tent. 
He  sat  down  on  his  bed  of  fir  boughs  and  looked  a  long 
time  into  the  graying  horizon.  "The  tent  is  empty,"  said 
the  wind  that  swept  in  about  him  from  the  hills.  He  heard 
it  plainly.  It  swished  at  the  canvas.  "The  tent  is  so  large 
— and  empty." 

The  blanket  seemed  much  too  large  as  he  drew  it  over 
him.  The  night  was  chill,  too.  "Come  back,  little  cub," 
the  pine  trees  murmured  over  his  head.  He  was  an  Indian, 
and  he  understood  them  well.  "Come  back,  little  cub — for 
the  tent  seems  empty  and  my  bed  is  cold." 

The  Indian  always  remembers.  It  was  a  peculiar  thing, 
learned  by  frontiersmen  long  ago,  that  the  Indian  seems 
unable  to  forget.  He  cannot  forget  an  injury,  and  there  are 
many  unpleasant  legends  that  prove  this  fact.  He  never 
forgets  an  enemy,  and  men  who  have  had  hard  work  to 
remember  a  savage  face  peering  from  behind  the  sights  of 
a  rifle  have  learned  this  lesson  very  dearly.  And  to  their 
friends,  to  those  who  have  won  their  deep,  dark  sort  of 
love,  they  are  simply  faithful  to  the  death. 

Most  white  men  would  have  forgotten  little  Woof.  Even 
a  mountaineer,  bred  in  a  land  where  all  emotions  are  simple 
and  intense,  would  probably  not  have  missed  him  after  the 
first  few  weeks.  But  it  was  not  this  way  with  Long  Tom. 
The  sun  never  rose  and  the  stars  never  burned  in  the  sky 
when  he  did  not  feel  his  pet's  absence. 

The  first  few  days  he  had  simply  hunted  far  and  wide, 
and  called  from  the  hilltops.    Then  his  crafty  Indian  brain 


Jungle  Justice  79 

began  to  work.  He  went  back  to  his  tent  and  hunted  for 
clues.  And  he  knew  perfectly,  at  the  first  glance,  that  Gibbs 
had  told  him  one  lie  at  least.  Woof  had  not  broken  away 
the  very  day  of  Long  Tom's  return.  The  spoor  was  too 
old.  Evidently  the  escape  was  made  within  three  days 
after  his  departure. 

Then  he  examined  the  chain.  The  broken  ends  were 
oddly  flattened  out.  A  mere  straight  pull  could  not  have 
done  this.  They  looked  as  if  they  had  been  broken  with  a 
hammer.    And  then  Long  Tom  sat  down  on  his  cot  to  think. 

His  first  impulse  was  to  go  and  lie  beside  the  river,  his 
rifle  in  the  hollow  of  his  arm.  Jim  Gibbs  would  come  by, 
soon.  Nor  did  Long  Tom  ever  miss,  once  he  saw  his  game 
along  the  barrel  of  his  rifle.  But  perhaps  it  was  better  to 
wait.  He  was  a  mountain  man;  and  long  ago  he  had 
learned  to  wait  with  patience  and  fortitude.  Besides,  jus- 
tice might  be  obtained  in  a  more  fitting  manner. 

Soon  after  this  he  made  an  expedition  down  into  the  foot- 
hills. He  questioned  a  few  people,  and  the  questions  led 
him  even  to  the  town  in  the  valley.  One  day  he  talked 
to  a  newspaper  reporter;  and  reporters  have  a  way  of  know- 
ing all  things.  After  that,  Long  Tom  went  back  quietly 
to  his  tent  in  the  hills — to  wait  until  a  certain  circus  should 
come  again. 

"It  comes  every  summer,"  the  newspaper  man  had  told 
him.    "And  the  year  will  pass  quickly." 

In  this  the  reporter  was  mistaken.  The  year  did  not 
go  particularly  fast  for  either  Long  Tom  or  his  pet.  One 
waited  in  a  shelter  in  the  hills,  watching  his  traps  and  listen- 
ing to  the  voices  of  the  lonely  wind.  They  still  talked  to 
him.  The  pine  trees  had  the  same  voices.  He  beheld  the 
leaves  fall,  one  by  one,  revealing  the  end  of  autumn;  and 


80      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

he  wanted  to  shake  the  rest  of  them  from  the  tree.  He  saw 
the  flowers  pass;  and  his  thoughts  sped  their  departure.  The 
winter  months  dragged  to  spring,  and  never  did  the  snow 
seem  to  melt  so  slowly.  And  the  spring,  always  before 
passing  much  too  swiftly,  seemed  longer  than  a  lifetime 
itself. 

To  little  Woof,  the  seasons  seemed  all  the  same.  He 
had  forgotten  that  the  stars  were  white  and  sharp  in  win- 
ter, and  warm  and  soft  in  spring.  He  had  forgotten  that 
there  were  such  things  as  stars.  All  things  had  ceased  to 
matter ;  and  only  the  wind  sometimes  blew  to  him  a  memory 
of  what  was  past.  The  circus  men  said  that  he  was  always 
restless  when  the  wind  blew.  But  they  did  not  know  why. 
He  would  make  a  thousand  journeys  up  and  down  his  cage ; 
and  at  such  times  he  didn't  seem  to  know  his  trainer. 

He  could  not  even  bury  in  the  snow,  and  forget  his  bars 
and  the  rumbling  wheels  and  the  sawdust  smell.  He  could 
only  pace  back  and  forth,  regularly  as  a  pendulum  swing- 
ing from  a  clock,  until  even  his  trainers  began  to  wonder 
at  him.  Mostly  they  were  kind  to  him,  but  all  the  kind- 
ness in  the  world  could  not  make  up  for  the  chains  he  wore 
and  the  bars  that  inclosed  him.  He  was  altogether  in- 
different to  their  kindnesses.  He  went  through  his  tricks 
at  their  command,  wholly  and  entirely  bored  by  the  crowds 
that  cheered  him.  He  wanted  the  old  times  back  again, 
the  mystery  and  the  silence,  the  smells  and  sounds  and  dan- 
gers. He  longed  for  the  rough  love  and  the  rough  games. 
He  did  not  even  know  when  summer  came. 

But  one  night  the  trainers  noticed  he  seemed  more  rest- 
less than  ever.  They  had  come  back  to  a  certain  valley  in 
southern  Oregon,  the  same  place  they  had  played  the  year 
before.     There  was  a  cool  wind  blowing  in  from  the  hills, 


Jungle  Justice  81 

and  at  the  first  breath  Woof  suddenly  stood  upright  in 
his  cage.  Then  he  charged  full  at  the  bars,  hurling  his 
weight  against  them. 

"It's  mighty  plain  to  me,"  the  trainer  said,  when  he  came 
to  quiet  him.  "This  is  Woof's  own  country.  We  bought 
him  from  that  hill-billy  Gibbs  almost  a  year  ago — in  this 
very  town." 

But  it  was  no  easy  task  to  quiet  Woof.  The  madness 
was  upon  him.  He  flung  himself  again  and  again  against 
the  bars.  His  spirit  was  broken,  and  the  indifference  of 
despair  had  all  at  once  given  way  to  a  desperate  resolve  to 
escape  or  die. 

The  full-grown  black  bear  that  shared  his  cage  retired 
to  a  corner.  He  was  the  crossest,  surliest  animal  in  the 
circus,  and  ordinarily  he  liked  to  bully  the  two-year-old. 
But  it  was  noticeable  that  he  remained  discreetly  polite  to- 
day.    Woof  was  in  a  fighting  mood. 

The  crowds  filed  into  the  animal  tent,  but  Woof  did  not 
even  glance  at  them.  They  laughed  at  him  awhile.  Then 
they  drifted  on  into  the  main  tent  and  left  him  to  his  rage. 

But  all  at  once  he  stopped  short.  His  savage  bark  cut 
off  sharp  after  a  single  syllable.  The  animal  tent  was 
deserted  by  trainers  and  crowds  alike;  so  there  were  no 
spectators  to  wonder  at  him.  All  of  them  were  busy  ini 
the  main  tent.  The  bear  stood  like  a  form  in  metal,  ears 
cocked  forward,  scarcely  breathing. 

It  was  just  a  smell  at  first, — a  smell  that  swept  him  back 
twelve  months  of  time  in  a  single  breath.  Then  it  was  a 
sound  of  footsteps  on  the  sawdust, — the  sound  of  some  one 
creeping  close  to  the  canvas  wall.  And  even  before  he 
saw  the  dark  face  at  the  bars,  Woof  knew  who  had  come. 

It  was  Long  Tom,  his  master  of  long  ago.     It  was  the 


82      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

same  dusky  face,  the  same  dark  eyes  and  tall  form.  It 
was  the  same  voice,  whispering  in  the  same,  never-to-be- 
forgotten  tone  of  command.  "Woof,"  the  man  said.  "Be 
quiet,  Woof!     I've  come  to  get  you." 

He  spoke  in  his  own  language;  but  the  bear  seemed  to 
understand.  "Be  quiet,  Woof,"  he  warned  again.  But 
Woof  could  not  be  quiet.  With  a  bellow  that  frightened 
the  deer  in  their  pens,  he  roared  out  his  welcome,  and 
flung  himself  in  rapture  against  the  bars. 

Long  Tom  laid  his  plans  carefully,  and  he  did  not  make 
a  false  step.  He  had  but  one  ally, — a  newspaper  man  with 
whom  he  had  talked  a  year  before.  Perhaps  the  latter  took 
a  real  interest  in  the  Indian's  attempt  to  get  back  his  stolen 
pet.     Perhaps  he  simply  wanted  a  story. 

Night  had  come  down,  and  the  oil  lamps  danced  when 
Long  Tom  met  Gibbs  on  the  circus  grounds.  He  had  known 
Gibbs  would  come.  The  mountain  folk  never  missed  a 
circus.  Gibbs  had  been  somewhat  apprehensive  all  day,  for 
fear  that  Long  Tom  would  recognize  his  pet;  but  it  seemed 
that  the  Indian  had  forgotten.  Gibbs  had  never  seen  him 
so  affable.  If  he  had  been  a  wiser  mountaineer,  he  would 
have  been  suspicious  at  once.  Indians  are  rarely  affable 
unless  there  is  something  in  the  wind. 

"Firewater,"  Long  Tom  said  simply.  He  pointed  to 
a  curious  bulge  at  his  hip.  It  was  the  one  thing  that  Gibbs 
felt  he  needed  to  complete  a  perfect  day.  He  had  seen  the 
circus  and  the  side  shows,  and  he  had  paid  his  last  quarter 
for  a  rather  disappointing  device  called  "Patrick  at  the  Key- 
hole." He  did  not  object  at  all  to  a  quarter-mile  walk 
down  the  railroad  track  to  a  secluded  spot.  And  there  they 
found  the  reporter,  waiting  in  the  darkness. 

It  can  be  said  that  the  latter  had  no  hand  in  the  rather 


Jungle  Justice  83 

rough-and-tumble  work  that  ensued.  He  did  enjoy  it,  how- 
ever. He  even  went  so  far  as  to  emit  a  small,  shrill  cry 
of  encouragement  when  the  real  business  of  the  evening 
actually  began.  This  started  with  Long  Tom  suddenly  in- 
flicting a  little  six-inch  jolt  with  his  fist,  squarely  on  the 
point  of  Gibbs'  chin. 

Human  beings  are  not  constructed  to  stand  up  well  under 
a  blow  like  this.  It  can  be  relied  on  just  as  confidently  as  a 
drop  of  laudanum  or  a  breath  of  chloroform,  and  its  effect 
is  just  as  certain.  It  was  not  a  particularly  violent  blow. 
It  was  very  short  and  very  cool  and  remarkably  efficient.  A 
large  number  of  the  stars  began  to  fall  out  of  the  sky  and 
whiz  and  streak  before  Gibbs'  eyes.  He  wasn't  quite  sure 
what  happened  for  a  minute  or  two  thereafter.  When  he 
did  open  his  eyes  again,  his  hands  were  tied  tight  behind 
him,  his  feet  were  pinioned,  and  a  soft  cloth  absolutely  pro- 
hibited any  sound. 

It  was  then  that  terror  came  upon  him.  It  wasn't  as  if 
the  Indian  were  blind  and  wild  with  wrath.  Gibbs  knew 
fairly  well  what  could  be  expected  of  a  man  in  wrath, — 
a  few  such  things  as  blows  and  kicks  that  would  certainly 
do  no  more  than  send  him  to  the  hospital.  But  the  dark 
face  before  him  was  perfectly  grave,  perfectly  inscrutable 
and  impassive.  He  did  not  seem  to  be  angry  at  all,  just 
cold  and  sure  and  just.  The  handkerchief  in  his  mouth  was 
new  and  white,  bought,  in  fact,  for  the  occasion ;  and  Gibbs' 
skin  faded  to  almost  the  same  shade.  His  throat  muscles 
contracted  for  a  scream;  but  not  a  sound  came  out. 

The  Indian  put  him  across  his  shoulders  and  carried  him 
to  the  open  door  of  the  freight  car.  He  didn't  seem  to 
feel  the  weight  at  all.  And  from  the  deep  shadows  of  the 
car,  growling,  savage  voices  came  out  to  them. 


84      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

Gibbs  was  struggling  now,  every  inch  of  his  cold  skin 
creeping  with  terror.  It  seemed  such  a  ghastly  business. 
He  only  knew  that  wild  animals  of  some  kind  were  waiting 
in  the  car,  and  this  impassive  red  man  was  carrying  him  in 
to  them.  He  was  altogether  powerless  in  his  grasp.  Long 
Tom  seemed  scarcely  aware  that  the  man  was  struggling. 

It  all  went  like  clockwork.  The  reporter  had  done  his 
part.  Time  was  when  he  had  traveled  with  a  circus,  and 
he  knew  just  what  to  do.  He  stood  ready,  at  the  door 
of  an  iron  cage  in  the  darkness  of  the  car.  There  were 
living  creatures  in  the  cage, — beasts  that  flung  against  the 
cars  and  roared  and  growled.  Gibbs  was  too  frightened  to 
distinguish  the  friendly,  welcoming  roars  of  one  of  the 
creatures  from  the  angry  grunting  of  the  other.  He  only 
knew  that  some  high  justice,  immutable  as  the  stars,  had 
fallen  upon   him   at   last. 

The  reporter  opened  the  cage  door,  and  one  of  the  dark 
figures  bounded  through.  Woof  had  needed  no  urging. 
He  was  back  to  his  own  at  last.  The  Indian  lifted  Gibbs 
from  his  back  and  set  him  on  his  feet,  facing  the  cage.  He 
slipped  one  of  his  strong  arms  behind  the  elbows,  just  above 
the  pinioned  hands.  Then,  while  the  reporter  with  one 
motion  severed  the  bonds,  the  Indian  thrust  him  through 
the  cage  door  into  Woof's  place. 

"Good  God,  Tom!"  the  man  yelled,  when  he  could  snatch 
off  his  gag.     "Are  you  goin'  to  leave  me  here  to  be  et  up?" 

For  the  door  had  swung  shut  after  him,  and  Woof's  com- 
panion was  growling  like  forty  demons  in  the  corner.  Per- 
haps the  reporter  laughed  in  the  darkness, — Woof's  roars 
mostly  obscured  the  sound.  Long  Tom  looked  closely  at  the 
lock  of  the  cage  door  before  he  answered.     It  was  a  most 


Jungle  Justice  85 

satisfactory  lock,  one  that  could  not  possibly  be  worked 
from  within.    "Turn  about — fair  play,"  he  grunted  gravely. 

Then  they  went  away  and  left  him,  howling  in  the  cage. 

Certain  gray  old  circus  men,  traveling  up  and  down  the 
long  lanes  of  the  world,  have  one  story  that  they  particularly 
love  to  tell.  It  concerns  how  certain  of  them  went  to  one 
of  the  animal  cars  in  the  gray  of  dawn  and  found  Jim 
Gibbs,  almost  petrified  with  fright,  in  the  bear  cage.  Of 
course  he  was  unhurt.  Spending  a  night  in  the  same  cage 
with  a  black  bear  may  be  a  most  uncomfortable  proceeding, 
but  barring  accidents,  it  is  no  more  dangerous  than  spending 
the  same  length  of  time  in  jail.  And  although  Gibbs  threat- 
ened all  manner  of  suits,  the  circus  men  only  rolled  around 
on  the  ground  and  laughed  at  him.  Moreover  they  told 
him  that  they  would  answer  his  charge  with  an  indictment 
for  selling  stolen  property;  for  the  reporter  had  written  a 
cracking  good  story  for  his  daily  that  explained  the  whole 
matter  and  left  Gibbs  without  a  case. 

It  is  doubtful  if  Long  Tom  and  his  pet  ever  saw  the  story. 
But  they  did  see  the  pines  and  the  waters,  which  was  really 
better.  And  their  tent  seems  no  longer  large  and  empty. 
The  call  of  the  pine  trees  has  ceased  to  be  plaintive  and 
sad  in  Long  Tom's  ears.  Sleeping  together,  under  the 
same  warm  blankets,  it's  a  cruel  wind  or  a  cold  snow  that 
can  chill  or  harm  them. 


SHAG  OF  THE  PACKS 

Just  who  is  the  ultimate  authority  in  the  southern  Oregon 
forests  is  a  question  that  has  never  been  settled.  It  is  really 
an  important  matter.  Most  naturalists  disagree  with  one 
another,  and  it  is  likely  that  the  forest  folk — the  creatures  of 
talon  and  paw  and  wing — disagree  among  themselves.  It 
does  very  well  to  say  in  the  abstract  that  the  lion  is  the  recog- 
nized king  of  beasts,  but  if  his  dominion  has  spread  to  the 
forests  of  the  lake  region  it  is  yet  to  be  discovered.  There 
are  several  of  the  larger  animals  that  would  likely  question 
his  sovereignty. 

For  instance,  there  are  the  bears.  It  is  hard  to  imagine 
old  Woof  being  bossed  around  by  any  one.  He  has  an  inde- 
pendent spirit,  and  except  from  human  beings  that  really 
don't  count,  a  bear  will  not  run  from  any  living  creature. 
But  while  he  doesn't  intend  to  be  ruled,  he  is  much  too 
lazy  and  amiable  and  forgetful  to  try  to  rule  any  one 
else.  No  one  in  his  right  senses  could  really  call  Woof  the 
forest  king. 

Any  naturalist  who  has  seen  a  cougar  stretch  out 
luxuriously  on  the  great,  gnarled  limb  of  a  tree  might  be 
inclined  to  think  that  he  has  aspirations  for  the  sovereignty. 
If  grace  and  agility  and  cruelty  could  make  a  king,  it  would 
not  be  necessary  to  look  any  further  than  Whisperfoot.  He 
has  the  same  sharp  talons  and  gleaming  fangs  of  his  cousin 
the  lion;  he  has  the  terrible,  sinuous,  resistless  strength  of 
the  felines;  and  he  is  one  of  the  largest  of  the  Oregon  wild 


Shag  of  the  Packs  87 

animals.  But  there  is  one  rather  serious  difficulty.  The 
cougar  is  graceful  and  stately  as  long  as  there  is  nothing  more 
dangerous  than  a  fawn  or  a  porcupine  in  sight.  A  ten- 
pound  terrier  can  usually  tree  him  in  a  minute. 

The  elk  is  the  largest  creature  in  the  Oregon  mountains 
and  seemingly  has  every  trait  of  the  monarch.  No  one  who 
has  beheld  his  stately  tread  in  the  fighting  days  of  fall  can 
believe  otherwise.  No  crown  of  gold  was  ever  more  won- 
derful than  the  many-tined  antlers  that  sweep  out  from 
the  beautiful  head,  and  not  even  a  cougar's  talons  are  better 
weapons  than  those  razor-edged  front  hoofs  of  the  great 
elk  bull.  It  is  a  powerful  cougar  who  will  care  to  attack 
an  elk  alone.  The  latter  has  a  way  of  getting  him  beneath 
his  hoofs  and  churning  back  and  forth,  about  as  deadly  a 
proceeding  as  a  cougar  ever  encounters.  The  elk  have  a  far- 
ringing,  triumphant  call  that  is  kingly  in  itself,  and  really 
they  are  the  most  noble  of  the  whole  deer  tribe.  Of  course, 
they  aren't  as  large  as  the  European  Elk,  which  is  really 
a  blood  brother  to  America's  moose;  but  they  are  true  stags 
with  none  of  the  latter's  awkwardness  and  general  un- 
gainliness. 

Then  there  are  the  lesser  aspirants,  the  poison  people  in 
particular.  Every  beast  in  the  forest — even  the  elk — turns 
from  his  trail  rather  than  tread  on  Loose-fang.  And  the 
buzzard  that  glides  all  day  on  his  motionless  wings  has 
even  a  stronger  claim  than  the  rattlesnake.  "All  things 
come  to  me  in  the  end,"  the  buzzard  boasts  to  his  fledglings. 
He  means  he  is  the  carrion  eater  of  the  forest,  and  thus 
he  is  the  ultimate  conqueror  of  all  things. 

But  when  all  is  said  and  done,  there  remain  the  wolves. 
There  is  an  old  legend  in  the  forest  that  they  were  the 
first  people,  and  it  is  certain  that  they  will  be  the  last  to  go. 


it 


88      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

Wherever  naturalists  have  gone,  into  the  most  trackless 
wildernesses  or  the  most  remote  prairies,  there  have  always 
been  wolves.  They  were  here  in  the  beginning,  and  they  will 
stay  to  the  end.  As  long  as  the  forest  endures,  the  packs 
will  flourish.  No  systematic  hunting,  not  trap  nor  poison 
nor  gun,  can  completely  conquer  them.  They  have  the  right 
proportion  of  cunning  and  cowardice  and  frenzied  bravery 
to  win  in  the  struggle  for  existence,  and  this  is  only  one 
of  the  reasons  why,  after  all,  perhaps  the  wolves  are  the 
real  heart  and  soul  and  rulers  of  the  wilderness. 

It  is  true  that  the  wolf  pack  is  the  single,  greatest  hunting 
machine  in  the  whole  wild  world.  No  individual  creature, 
except  a  strong  man  with  an  unerring  rifle,  can  hope  to 
stand  against  it.  Woe  to  the  stately  elk  on  whose  track 
the  wolf  pack  sings  in  winter!  In  the  desperation  of  their 
hunger,  even  old  Woof  is  not  safe  from  them.  No  snow  is 
deep  enough,  no  cold  sufficiently  severe,  or  no  land  so  terrible 
and  bleak  that  the  wolf  pack  can  be  entirely  conquered.  They 
go  to  the  barren  reaches  of  the  poles,  and  when  all  the  other 
forest  creatures  have  migrated  south  or  buried  in  the  snow, 
they  range  the  wintry  mountains  alone. 

To  know  the  wolves  from  fang  to  tail,  goes  an  old 
saying,  is  to  know  the  forest.  They  typify  the  wilderness 
above  all  other  living  things.  They  are  its  symbol  and  sign, 
eternal  as  the  pines  themselves;  moody  as  the  forests  and 
deadly  as  the  snows.  The  strength  of  the  mountains  is  the 
strength  of  the  pack, — remorseless,  unconquered,  resistless. 
And  the  song  that  the  wailing  wolf  pack  sings  in  the  winter 
nights  is  the  very  voice  and  articulation  of  the  wilderness, 
note  for  note  and  sound  for  sound, — sad  beyond  all  measure- 
ment and  wild  past  all  power  of  words  to  tell. 

It  is  not  that  the  wolves  have  any  commendable  qualities. 


Shag  of  the  Packs  89 

A  lone  wolf  is  a  distressing  coward.  The  whole  breed  is 
hated  and  feared  wherever  men  have  gone.  The  only  war 
that  is  known,  in  Lapland,  is  the  war  against  the  wolves. 
But  their  vices  only  make  them  more  typical  of  the  wilder- 
ness. They  are  treacherous,  but  so  is  a  mountain  trail.  They 
are  stealthy,  but  whoever  has  heard  the  wind  creeping 
through  the  pine  tops  at  night  knows  that  it  is  stealthy,  too. 
They  are  silent  and  full  of  cunning.  And,  above  all  things, 
they  are  imbued  with  that  terrible  remorselessness  of  the 
wilderness, — a  merciless  savagery  that,  once  met,  never  is 
forgotten. 

There  are  plenty  of  reasons  why,  in  folklore,  the  wolf  has 
always  been  thought  of  as  some  gray  demon  of  the  snow,  the 
very  antithesis  of  all  that  is  dear  and  true  in  life.  Only  in 
the  far  remote  past,  in  certain  pagan  tribes  where  cruelty 
was  virtue,  have  the  wolves  ever  been  regarded  with  any- 
thing but  hatred  and  terror.  They  are  the  one  breed  of 
all  the  higher  creatures  that  will  ruthlessly  commit  canni- 
balism on  their  mates.  They  are  one  of  the  few  breeds  that 
seems  to  have  no  pack  rule  against  the  killing  of  men.  They 
lack  the  beauty  of  the  deer,  the  intellect  of  the  elephant, 
the  faithfulness  of  the  dog  or  horse.  They  have  only 
their  savage  cunning,  their  relentless  cruelty,  and  their  old 
degenerate  creed  that  has  always  been  the  direct  opposite  to 
the  creed  of  civilization, — that  no  mercy  or  justice  or  moral 
issue  must  stand  between  them  and  their  survival.  They 
have  a  strange,  merciless  hatred  for  their  cousins,  the  dogs; 
and  most  naturalists  have  wondered  why.  Perhaps  it  is 
just  the  hatred  that  dark  angels  have  always  had  for  the 
bright, — because  the  dogs  have  given  their  love  and  services 
to  men. 

And  while  this  is  the  story  of  the  wolf  pack,  it  is  also 


90      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

the  story  of  Shag,  the  shepherd  with  the  strain  of  a  greater 
breed.  It  is  the  tale  of  the  wolf  pack's  law,  and  a  higher 
law  that  has  fallen,  whence  no  man  knows,  to  show  the  way 
in  the  upward  climb  of  man  and  beast. 


Silas  Lennox  had  a  calendar  hung  on  the  white  walls 
of  his  cabin;  but  he  didn't  need  its  word  to  know  that  the 
month  was  May.  He  was  rather  like  the  beasts,  in  this  re- 
spect. He  had  lived  long  enough  in  the  forest  to  know  the 
sign  and  mark  of  every  change  in  the  seasons. 

The  wild  creatures  that  lived  in  the  mountains  about  his 
cabin  never  saw  a  calendar  from  their  life's  beginning  to 
its  end ;  but  yet  they  never  made  any  mistake  about  the  sea- 
sons. The  very  faces  of  the  mountains  were  calendars  to 
them.  In  the  summer  these  were  rather  tawny  and  parched, 
and  the  rivers  dwindled  and  dried  up,  and  there  was  a 
smell  of  seasonal  flowers  and  drying  marshes  and  sunbaked 
earth.  The  twigs  got  so  dry  and  brittle  that  they  sometimes 
could  hear  even  Whisperfoot,  the  cougar,  as  he  stole  up  the 
deer  trails ;  and,  as  a  rule,  Whisperfoot  makes  about  as  much 
noise  as  the  stars  when  they  pop  through  the  twilight  sky. 
In  the  fall  the  mountains  were  golden  and  hazy  and  still,  and 
if  this  wasn't  sign  enough,  the  sight  of  old  Woof,  the  bear, 
gorging  and  sleeping  alternately  in  the  berry  thickets,  would 
indicate  the  reason  quite  unmistakably. 

The  smells  are  always  particularly  mysterious  in  the  fall. 
Some  of  them,  such  as  those  that  call  the  wolves  to  the 
pack  and  the  deer  to  the  herd,  are  quite  impossible  for 
human  beings  to  perceive.  In  the  winter  all  smells  are  ob- 
literated; but  there  are  plenty  of  other  signs  of  the  season. 


Shag  of  the  Packs  91 

There  is  the  snow,  endless  and  wan  in  the  moonlight,  bowing 
down  the  fir  limbs  until  it  seems  impossible  that  they  could 
ever  come  straight  again;  and  the  far-carrying  cry  of  the 
wolf  pack.  No  one  could  possibly  mistake  that  cry  for 
the  yell  that  the  pack  utters  when  the  wolves  first  congre- 
gate in  the  fall.  The  latter  cry  is  rather  triumphant,  simply 
charged  with  the  new  sense  of  might  that  their  numbers  give 
them.  But  the  song  saddens  as  the  winter  advances.  And 
at  last  the  pack  begins  to  sing  about  a  certain  grim  and 
terrible  spirit  that  walks  over  the  ever-deepening  snow,  and 
which  makes  himself  particularly  well  known  to  the  wolves. 
He  is  Starvation,  and  once  to  hear  the  wild,  sad  song  that  is 
made  to  him  is  to  remember  it  until  death.  When  Lennox 
heard  it,  he  always  knew  that  winter  had  come  in  earnest. 
Naturalist  and  hunter  and  mountaineer,  he  had  come  to 
know  the  mountains  almost  as  well  as  the  forest  creatures 
themselves. 

Now  it  was  May,  and  the  signs  were  everywhere.  The 
snow  was  melting  on  the  lower  levels,  quaint  little  modest 
mountain  flowers  were  blossoming  in  the  young  grass  and 
blowing  everywhere  the  faintest,  most  delightful  perfume  that 
could  be  imagined.  The  whole  forest  life  was  wakening: 
birds  from  the  south  and  rodents  from  the  ground  and  even 
old  Woof  out  of  his  cavern  in  the  snowdrifts.  Likely  he 
was  puzzled  by  the  aspect  of  nature.  It  had  been  all  white 
and  cold  when  he  had  gone  to  sleep.  Now  it  was  green 
and  fragrant  and  inviting.  But  as  life  was  just  one  long 
puzzle  to  Woof  from  beginning  to  end,  as  it  is  to  all  really 
philosophical  people,  he  forgot  it  speedily  and  shuffled  away 
to  hunt  grubs. 

But  of  all  the  signs  of  spring,  there  was  none  more 
evident  than  a  certain  miracle  that  had  occurred  in  Lennox's 


92      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

woodshed,  not  five  days  before.  All  over  the  mountain 
realm,  this  same  miracle  was  occurring  daily.  Everywhere 
the  females  of  the  several  species  were  leaving  their  herds 
or  their  packs,  and  stealing  away  into  the  thickets.  The 
young  of  the  forest  folk  are  all  born  in  spring,  and  the 
shepherd's  litter  had  not  been  an  exception.  Four  little, 
ratlike  creatures  lay  huddled  together  on  one  of  Lennox's 
old  coats,  and  even  now  they  were  whimpering  for  their 
mother's  return. 

And,  curiously,  Lennox  himself  was  waiting  for  the  same 
thing.  The  shepherd  did  not  usually  stay  out  on  the  hills 
after  night-fall.  There  were  certain  good  reasons  why, 
among  them  the  particular  prevalence  of  wolves.  She  had 
disappeared  just  before  twilight,  evidently  on  one  of  her 
rambling  excursions  through  the  mountains.  Darkness  had 
come  down,  fleet  and  mysterious  as  ever,  and  she  had  not  yet 
returned. 

Lennox  stood  at  his  cottage  threshold,  his  quiet  eyes 
intent  on  the  forests  that  stretched  in  front.  Only  a  faint 
glimmer  lingered  in  the  west.  He  could  see  the  profile  of  dis- 
tant pines  against  the  sky  line;  and  the  light  from  his  cabin 
door  died  quickly  in  the  shadows.  He  was  not  quite  alone. 
A  woman  worked  about  the  cookstove,  and  a  little  girl,  per- 
haps eleven  years  old,  stood  fumbling  at  his  hands. 

The  silence  of  the  mountains  depends  entirely  on  how 
intently  one  listens.  Sometimes,  to  the  casual  ear,  they  seem 
absolutely  silent.  And  this  is  a  silence  not  soon  to  be  for- 
gotten, in  which  no  leaf  stirs  or  wind  whispers;  and  at 
such  times  it  is  some  way  vaguely  distressing  to  hear  the 
pronounced  stir  and  beat  of  one's  own  pulse.  But,  listening 
keenly,  sometimes  other  sounds  can  be  heard,  usually  at  long 
intervals  and  so  faint  that  one  can  never  be  quite  sure  of  their 


Shag  of  the  Packs  93 

reality.  They  do  not  in  the  least  destroy  the  effect  of 
absolute  silence.  They  seem  rather  to  accentuate  it, — the 
faint  snap  of  a  footstep  on  a  dry  twig,  the  rustle  of  a  wing, 
or  the  stir  of  a  rodent.  Lennox's  ears  were  keen,  and  it 
seemed  to  him  that  the  darkness  was  vibrant  and  poignant 
with  such  little,  hushed  sounds. 

They  didn't  mar  the  fine  edge  of  his  nerve.  He  was 
used  to  them.  But  at  the  same  time  he  was  rapidly  growing 
apprehensive  as  to  the  fate  of  his  shepherd  dog. 

A  few  minutes  before  he  had  heard  the  timber  wolves 
at  their  hunting.  Their  numbers  were  evidently  few,  merely 
the  remainder  of  the  pack  that  had  not  yet  broken  up,  con- 
sisting of  a  few  young  males  and  barren  females.  As  usual, 
he  had  been  able  to  distinguish  four  or  five  separate  tones,  in- 
dicating at  least  that  many  animals.  They  had  found  some 
kind  of  game  on  the  ridge ;  and  Lennox  was  perfectly  aware 
that  he  had  likely  seen  his  pet  for  the  last  time.  The  cries 
he  had  heard  had  been  the  piercing  barks  of  a  fighting  pack, 
and  that  fact  meant  either  they  had  encountered  a  cougar 
or  a  bear,  or  else  had  attacked  his  shepherd.  Deer,  the 
usual  game  of  wolves,  do  not  necessitate  a  fight.  Bear  and 
cougar  are  rarely  attacked  except  when  the  pack  is  starving. 
A  dog,  however,  is  always — except  possibly  a  slut  in  the 
rutting  season — fair  game  to  the  wolf  pack. 

He  had  always  depended  on  the  dog's  speed  to  protect  her 
from  the  wolves.  It  was  true  that  they  could  wear  her  out  in 
a  long  chase,  but  under  most  conditions  she  would  have 
been  able  to  reach  the  cottage  in  safety.  He  wondered  if  she 
had  been  taken  by  surprise  or  surrounded. 

"The  puppies  are  whimpering,"  his  daughter  told  him. 
"They're  hungry  for  their  supper." 

He  looked  down  at  her  with  a  singularly  sweet  smile. 


94      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

It  would  have  surprised  an  onlooker.  The  stern  face  of  the 
mountaineer  had  not  seemed  capable  of  such  lightning  change 
in  expression. 

"And  only  Shep  can  give  it  to  them,  too,"  her  father  an- 
swered. He  knew  perfectly  that  by  no  conceivable  cir- 
cumstances, if  the  shepherd  were  killed,  could  he  hope  to  save 
the  litter.  He  lived  as  much  alone  as  the  Innuits  in  the 
Arctic,  and  there  was  no  milk  for  the  whimpering  pups. 

But  at  that  instant,  the  child  clapped  its  hands.  She 
saw  the  form  of  a  dog  stealing  toward  them  out  of  the 
shadows.  Then  both  of  them  stiffened.  Shep  had  come 
home,  but  both  of  them  knew  at  the  same  instant  that  she 
had  only  come  home  to  die. 

It  is  a  curious  instinct  that  causes  all  living  creatures  to 
seek  shelter  in  their  final  hour.  Soldiers  had  observed  this 
phenomenon  too  many  times  for  a  possibility  of  a  mistake. 
Perhaps  it  is  an  instinct  having  its  source  in  the  young  days 
of  the  race, — a  last  effort  to  protect  the  lifeless  body  from 
the  wild  things  of  the  field.  It  is  the  same  impulse  that 
causes  a  wounded  soldier  to  creep  under  the  scantiest  bush  for 
his  last  breath.  At  first,  in  the  dim  light,  Shep  seemed  to 
be  stealing  along  with  belly  close  to  the  ground,  after  the 
manner  of  a  stalking  animal.  But  when  she  came  close, 
the  girl  hid  her  face. 

Shep  had  met  the  pack  on  the  ridge;  and,  although  her 
swift  legs  had  enabled  her  to  escape  from  them,  she  had  been 
mortally  wounded.  A  savage  bite  had  torn  at  one  of  the 
great  veins  in  the  shoulder.  "Shep!  Old  Shep!"  the  moun- 
taineer whispered,  as  he  bent  over  the  shuddering  form. 
The  emotions  of  the  mountain  men  are  primitive  and  deep. 
Lennox  had  loved  his  dog  as  he  had  his  own  family.    And 


Shag  of  the  Packs  95 

her  loss  meant  the  death  of  the  whelps,  too.  And  it  is  not 
good  to  live  in  the  mountains  without  a  dog. 

For  a  little  while  he  stood  staring  into  the  darkness,  his 
dark  features  intent.  But  in  a  moment,  he  laughed  at  his 
own  folly.  If  any  of  the  mountain  men  of  his  neighborhood 
had  killed  his  dog  there  would  have  been  debts  to  pay.  But 
no  vengeance  could  be  taken  from  the  creatures  of  the  wild. 
In  the  first  place,  the  range  was  inhabited  by  a  thousand 
wolves,  any  one  of  which  might  have  been  the  slayer.  At 
once  he  turned  his  thought  to  the  problem  of  saving  the 
whelps. 

He  walked  about  to  his  woodshed  and  held  a  candle 
over  them.  There  were  four  of  them,  all  whimpering.  He 
examined  each  in  turn.  One  was  a  particularly  splendid 
specimen,  almost  half  again  as  large  as  any  of  the  others, 
and  a  male.  Evidently  it  had  partaken  of  many  of  the  quali- 
ties of  the  great  hound  that  was  its  father. 

All  at  once  he  laughed  in  the  darkness.  It  was  not  that 
he  had  so  soon  forgotten  the  death  of  his  pet.  It  was  just 
then  an  idea,  so  bizarre  and  strange  that  he  could  hardly 
give  it  credence,  had  flashed  into  his  mind.  He  saw  a  way 
in  which  he  might  save  the  life  of  this  largest  of  the  whelps. 
But  it  was  such  an  ironic  thing;  and  the  grim  sense  of 
humor  that  the  mountains  imbue  brought  the  short  syllable 
of  laughter  to  his  lips. 

While  sharing  the  universal  hatred  of  the  wolves,  Silas 
Lennox  had  an  intense  interest  in  all  the  wild  life  about 
him.  He  was  really  quite  an  accomplished  naturalist;  and 
now  the  plan  that  had  occurred  to  him  would  have  done 
credit  to  a  scientist.  As  an  experiment,  it  promised  all  man- 
ner of  interesting  developments.  For  a  long  moment  his 
daughter's  questions  went  unanswered. 


96      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

On  his  return  from  a  tramp  across  the  ridges  late  that 
afternoon,  he  had  flushed  a  she-wolf  from  a  great  clifflike 
pile  of  rocks  on  the  mountainside.  It  was  an  old  resort 
for  wolves,  and  he  had  been  confident  at  once  that  the 
female  had  a  litter  of  wolf  cubs  in  one  of  its  caverns.  He 
had  vaguely  intended  to  return  within  a  few  days  and  kill 
the  cubs  for  the  bounty.  But  the  prize  money  would  only 
amount  to  a  few  dollars,  and  the  satisfaction  that  he  would 
get  from  his  experiment  would  more  than  make  up  for 
them. 

So  he  took  the  largest  of  the  cubs  and  carried  it  into  the 
house  with  him.  The  mountain  night  is  never  to  be  trifled 
with.  The  warmth  of  the  slut's  body  had  preserved  the 
lives  of  the  whelps  on  previous  nights,  but  he  wished  to  run 
no  risks  with  little  Shag.  Just  why  he  named  him  Shag  was 
something  of  a  mystery.  It  was  certain  that  the  hair  that 
covered  the  little  body  was  not  yet  long  enough  to  justify 
the  name.  All  night  long  the  cub  whimpered  its  hunger, 
wrapped  in  a  great  coat  behind  the  kitchen  stove. 

"Don't  worry,  old  chap,"  the  mountaineer  called  to  him 
as  he  went  to  his  own  bed.  "To-morrow  night  you'll  have 
somebody  warm  to  sleep  with." 

It  was  a  curious  thing, — the  little  drama  that  transpired 
just  before  dawn.  Lennox  rose  and  dropped  the  pup  into 
the  pocket  of  his  coat.  Then  he  climbed  up  slowly  to  the  pile 
of  rocks  that  he  had  passed  on  the  preceding  afternoon. 

But  he  didn't  seek  at  once  for  the  cavern.  The  reason  was 
extremely  simple.  Wolves  are  cowardly  as  a  rule;  but 
Lennox  knew  enough  of  animals  to  know  that  no  trust  must 
be  placed  in  a  she-wolf  with  cubs.  Sometimes  they  dis- 
play a  sudden,  desperate  courage  that  isn't  pleasant  to  face. 
He  climbed  up  to  a  vantage  point  about  one  hundred  yards 


Shag  of  the  Packs  97 

from  the  rock  pile.  It  was  noticeable  that  he  kept  to  the 
windward  of  the  rocks,  and  that  he  walked  with  extreme 
caution. 

He  knew  the  way  of  the  wolves.  He  thought  he  wouldn't 
have  long  to  wait.  A  half  hour  passed,  and  the  dawn  bright- 
ened. Then  he  saw  the  she-wolf  come  stalking  forth  from 
her  lair. 

Lennox  sat  perfectly  still.  A  single  twitch  of  a  muscle 
might  have  given  him  away.  The  she-wolf  sniffed,  looked 
about  intently,  then  turned  down  the  canon.  Still  the  man 
sat  motionless.  As  he  had  anticipated,  in  a  moment  the  wolf 
came  circling  back.  Assured  this  time  that  no  danger 
threatened  her  whelps,  she  trotted  boldly  down  the  glen  and 
disappeared  in  the  brush  at  its  end. 

A  moment  more  the  mountaineer  waited,  to  make  certain 
that  the  wolf  would  not  reappear.  Then  he  crept  down  to 
the  rock  pile.  It  was  but  the  work  of  a  moment  to  find  the 
cavern.  Its  entrance  was  narrow,  and  he  had  to  lie  almost 
flat  to  creep  in.  And  it  was  to  be  noted  that  he  carried 
his  pistol  ready  in  his  hand.  Lennox  was  mountaineer 
enough  to  know  that  occasionally  the  male  wolf  will  remain 
on  guard  over  the  whelps;  and  he  wished  to  be  prepared  for 
emergencies.  A  wolf  cornered  in  a  cavern  is  not  pleasant 
to  encounter. 

He  scratched  a  match;  then  chuckled  aloud.  It  was  just 
as  he  had  thought.  Five  wolf  cubs,  not  yet  a  week  old,  lay  in 
a  little  furry  heap  in  the  corner  of  the  cavern.  They  whined 
at  the  hand  that  stretched  to  them. 

Lennox  spent  no  more  time  in  the  lair  than  was  absolutely 
necessary.  He  chose  the  nearest  of  the  whelps  and  dropped  it 
into  his  pocket.     From  the  opposite  pocket  he  took  the 


98      The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

whimpering  form  of  Shag.    And  he  dropped  him  into  the 
wolf  cub's  place. 

An  instant  later  he  was  crawling  back  into  the  light,  the 
joy  of  a  scientist  shining  in  his  eyes.  The  life  of  Shag,  grow- 
ing up  among  the  wolves,  would  be  an  absorbing  study  for 
years  to  come. 

II 

The  animal  intelligence  has  certain  very  definite  limits. 
This  fact  is  indisputable.  It  is  doubtful  that  the  she-wolf 
was  ever  aware  of  the  alien  presence  among  her  litter. 
It  was  not  that  she  could  not  see  in  the  gloomy  cavern.  The 
bright  circles  of  blue  fire  that  she  wore  for  eyes  were 
particularly  well  fitted  for  seeing  in  the  darkness.  It  was 
just  that  her  understanding  could  not  leap  far  enough  to 
conceive  of  the  substitution. 

It  was  true  that  she  knew  of  the  human  visitor.  She 
had  something  even  better  than  understanding, — a  nose  as 
sharp  and  sure  as  the  scientific  instruments  of  a  detective. 
At  first  she  was  greatly  disturbed.  She  stole  about  the  rock 
pile,  looking  for  enemies;  then  examined  her  cubs  to  see  that 
no  harm  •  had  befallen.  Little  Shag  was  lifted  tenderly 
between  her  strong  jaws,  shaken  for  sign  of  an  injury,  and 
deposited  with  the  rest.  She  was  not  in  the  least  suspicious 
of  him.  If  she  had  any  emotion  at  all  regarding  him, 
it  was  motherly  pride,  for  he  was  half  again  as  large  as 
the  other  cubs.  When  she  lay  down  among  them,  he  had 
strength  enough  to  push  away  one  of  his  foster  brothers  to  get 
at  his  dinner. 

He  thrived  on  the  strong  milk.  There  came  a  day  when 
his  eyes  were  completely  opened,  and  he  had  the  first  look 
at  his  foster  brothers.     They  were  still  blind,  and  he  nosed 


Shag  of  the  Packs  99 

them  with  impunity.  And  he  began  to  wonder  about  the 
piercing  light  that  flung  in  through  the  cavern  maw.  It 
hurt  his  eyes  at  first;  but  at  the  same  time  he  had  an  ir- 
resistible instinct  to  crawl  toward  it.  The  she-wolf,  re- 
turning from  a  hunt,  met  him  at  the  very  mouth  of  the 
cavern. 

She  knocked  him  back  among  his  brothers;  but  she  was 
proud  of  him  none  the  less.  That  he  would  already  start 
out  on  an  expedition  of  his  own,  on  the  day  that  sight  had 
come  to  his  eyes,  gave  promise  of  two  traits  that  should 
carry  him  far.  These  two  traits  are  very  essential  in  the 
forest.  One  leads  to  power,  even  to  sovereignty  of  the  pack. 
It  is  courage.  The  other,  no  less  important,  brings  knowl- 
edge. Old  Woof  has  such  a  large  bump  of  it  he  can  scarcely 
carry  it  around.  It  is  curiosity.  It  is  interesting  to  con- 
jecture where  human  beings  would  be  to-day  if  the  lesser 
people  from  which  we  sprung  had  not  been  simply  eaten 
up  with  curiosity  about  everything  under  the  sun.  It  has 
been  the  impulse  that  led  to  greatness. 

But  the  day  was  soon  to  come  when  the  mother  wolf 
was  to  take  her  brood  out  on  the  hillside  with  her.  The 
spring  was  drawing  to  early  summer.  And  possibly,  by 
now,  the  she-wolf  had  begun  to  have  vague  wonderings 
about  this  largest  of  her  children.  He  didn't  hold  his  ears 
quite  like  his  brothers.  Their  ears  were  always  pointed, 
intent  on  distant  sounds.  Shag  let  his  droop  back  in  a 
cifrious  way,  and  now  and  again  he  carried  his  tail  lifted 
rather  than  pointed  down.  He  had  a  reddish  tinge  and  softer 
fur.  But  she  couldn't  question  his  superiority.  He  was 
the  strongest  of  her  litter,  the  best  able  to  take  care  of  him- 
self in  the  awkward,  half-cocked,  snarling  tussles  that  they 
waged  among  themselves;  and  he  was  always  quickest  to 


ioo    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

learn.  And  the  strangest  thing  of  all  was  the  way  he 
wagged  his  tail,  back  and  forth,  when  he  was  pleased.  It 
was  a  motion  unknown  among  the  others. 

Then  the  hills  began  to  grow  yellow  and  still  in  the  long, 
hot  days  of  late  summer.  The  wolf  and  her  brood  ranged 
ever  farther.     They  were  learning  to  hunt. 

In  all  the  range  of  human  experience,  there  is  no  more 
keen  excitement  than  tht  first  hunt  of  a  wolf.  They  would 
start  out  at  the  first  fall  of  darkness,  and  little  Shag 
went  wild  with  rapture  at  the  first  breath  of  the  night. 
There  were  the  smells  pungent  and  wild  in  the  wind,  the 
sounds  of  the  whispering,  stirring  forest  life,  the  long 
shadows,  the  deep  thickets,  the  mystery  and  the  silence. 
Shag  was  a  dog,  but  all  dogs  are  first  cousins  to  the  wolves. 
The  hunting  came  natural  to  him. 

At  first  the  brood  kept  to  the  rear  of  their  mother  and 
had  no  hand  in  the  actual  killing.  But  once  she  let  them 
gather  about  a  stricken  fawn  from  which  the  life  had  not 
yet  fled.  She  taught  them  to  stalk — that  utter  silent  ad- 
vance that  is  the  accomplishment  of  most  of  the  wild  crea- 
tures, high  and  low — the  quick  lunge  and  recoil  that  in  a 
death  fight  can  tear  an  artery  to  shreds  and  fling  the  wolf 
back  to  safety;  and  one  day  she  fished  for  them  beside  a  little 
river  that  came  tumbling  into  one  of  the  Upland  Lakes. 
Fishing  was  an  art  in  itself.  It  required  the  most  ex- 
acting patience.  A  human  being,  fishing  for  trout,  is  usually 
ready  to  leave  a  hole  if  it  does  not  yield  up  a  strike  in 
a  dozen  casts.  The  old  she-wolf  thought  nothing  of  stand- 
ing beside  a  creek  for  a  full  hour,  as  motionless  as  a  form 
in  stone,  waiting  for  the  suspicious  trout  to  come  to  the 
surface.  Then  her  paw  would  whip  down  like  the  head 
of  a  serpent;  and  that  means  that  no  human  eye  could  fol- 


Shag  of  the  Packs     ;   ,     jqi 

low  it.  She  would  strike  the  fish  from  the  water  as  a  tennis 
player  strikes  the  ball  from  the  air. 

And  of  those  things  that  she  did  not  teach,  little  Shag 
had  a  whole  fund  of  instincts  to  tell  him.  Instincts  taught 
him  how  to  freeze  into  simply  a  motionless  dark  shadow, 
almost  invisible  in  the  thickets,  at  the  first  sign  of  danger. 
He  knew  how  to  drift  like  smoke  through  the  underbrush, 
how  to  creep  up  on  a  covey  of  grouse,  how  to  put  the  whole 
weight  of  his  body  behind  the  blow. 

Usually  he  hunted  with  his  little  foster  brothers.  Al- 
ready he  was  their  leader.  The  thousands  of  generations 
that  his  ancestors  had  lived  with  human  beings  had  in- 
stilled in  him  a  natural  sagacity  far  beyond  that  of  the  gen- 
eral run  of  wolf  cubs.  And  his  training  was  giving  him,  in 
addition,   that  superlative   cunning  of   the  wild   creatures. 

One  night  he  wakened  with  a  realization  that  a  change 
had  come  in  the  seasons.  The  hours  of  hunting  had 
lengthened,  and  now  it  seemed  to  him  that  the  daylight,  to 
be  spent  in  sleeping  in  the  cavern,  sped  like  a  breath. 
Berries  were  ripe  in  the  thickets,  and  old  Woof,  the  bear, 
shuffled  and  grunted  among  them  from  twilight  till  dawn. 
Shag  was  not  interested  in  berries  himself.  He  was  a  meat 
eater ;  and  he  felt  some  degree  of  scorn  for  the  piglike  crea- 
ture that  munched  them  with  such  delight.  The  leaves 
of  the  perennial  trees  were  splotched  with  reds  and  yellows, 
and  always  they  were  whisking  off  in  the  winds.  More  than 
once  their  rustle  had  frightened  him  in  the  night.  But  these 
things  were  not  the  greatest  change.  The  thing  that  moved 
him  most  was  a  new  stir,  a  new  impulse  in  the  air.  The  air 
was  crisp  and  cold,  and  it  made  his  blood  leap  in  his  veins. 
And  one  night  the  snow  fell  on  the  high  ridges,  lay  a  little 


102     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

while  in  a  mysterious  mantel  over  the  leaves,  and  then 
melted  away. 

And  in  the  last  days  of  fall,  little  Shag  was  introduced  to 
the  wolf  pack. 

He  heard  them  coming  a  long  way.  They  were  singing 
along  the  ridges,  a  wild,  strange  song  that  moved  him  more 
than  any  hunting.  The  sound  carried  far,  rising  and  fall- 
ing over  the  shadowed  forest,  and  its  echo  was  a  voice  that 
suddenly  spoke  out  of  Shag's  savage  heart.  He  found  him- 
self trembling  all  over.  And,  yes,  his  mother  was  trembling, 
too,  as  if  in  terror.    The  other  whelps  stood  behind  her. 

He  had  never  heard  the  pack  before,  for  the  simple  rea- 
son that  the  wolves  live  apart  all  through  the  summer  months. 
How  he  recognized  the  sound  at  once  is  a  mystery  that  most 
human  beings  would  not  care  to  attempt  to  explain.  Of 
course,  he  had  heard  his  mother's  voice,  raised  in  triumph 
over  her  kill.  Yet  the  sound  was  nothing  like  this  wild, 
strange  chant  that  came  soaring  down  from  the  ridges. 

His  mother  answered  the  call — a  swift,  joyous  bark — 
and  began  to  hasten  up  the  ridge  toward  the  pack.  And 
Shag  and  her  cubs  ran  behind  her. 

They  met  on  a  new  burn  on  the  very  top  of  the  ridge. 
Even  the  underbrush  had  been  burned  away,  and  the  gaunt 
forms  of  the  wolves  were  clear  and  sharp  in  the  moonlight. 
It  was  a  strange  place.  The  black  snags  cast  eerie  shadows, 
and  the  wind  made  a  queer  rustle  as  it  swayed  them  back 
and  forth.  The  she-wolf  barked  again,  and  some  of  the 
pack  answered  her. 

She  turned  her  head,  whining  to  her  cubs.  They  under- 
stood. She  was  calling  them  to  follow  her.  As  naturalists 
know,  the  wolf  cubs  are  usually  introduced  to  the  pack  in 
the  fall.    Once  inducted,  they  are  speedily  forgotten.  They 


Shag  of  the  Packs  103 

follow  the  old  gray  leader  on  the  hunt  until  the  spring 
comes,  and  then,  still  too  young  to  breed,  they  usually  hunt 
with  cubs  of  their  own  age  until  another  fall.  And  the  old 
gray  leader  of  the  pack — a  wolf  that  weighed  over  ninety 
pounds — came  sniffing  forward  to  greet  her. 

And  then  there  ensued  a  curious  interlude.  Usually  the 
introduction  of  the  cubs  to  the  pack  is  a  very  short  and 
uninteresting  ceremony.  A  few  of  the  mothers  look  them 
over  with  an  appraising  eye,  a  few  of  the  cubs  come  forward 
to  nudge  and  romp  with  them,  and  the  saucy  yearlings  pre- 
tend to  ignore  them  completely.  And  the  she-wolf  her- 
self had  never  dreamed  but  that  her  litter  would  be  admitted 
without  question.     But  she  hadn't  counted  on  Shag. 

The  entire  pack  seemed  to  see  him  at  the  same  instant. 
Their  bodies  whirled  in  the  leaves,  a  singular  sideways  jerk 
of  the  forequarters  as  if  by  the  recoil  of  a  powerful  spring 
that  brought  them  facing  him  in  a  fighting  position,  a  mo- 
tion as  instinctive  as  their  own  breathing.  A  dozen  of 
them  stood  crouching,  tense  and  silent  among  the  ruined 
trees. 

It  was  only  for  an  instant.  It  had  been  a  simple  reflex 
at  the  sight  of  an  ancient  enemy.  It  is  a  curious  thing  that 
no  more  intense  hatred  exists  in  the  animal  world  than  be- 
tween the  wolves  and  the  dogs.  The  pack  recognized  Shag 
at  once  as  one  of  their  hated  cousins.  The  older  wolves, 
seeing  him  among  the  she-wolf's  litter,  were  willing  to  wait 
and  question.     But  this  is  not  the  way  of  young  blood. 

Among  the  pack  was  a  certain  young  and  very  arrogant 
yearling,  and  he  had  been  hoping  all  the  night  for  an  oppor- 
tunity to  display  his  prowess.  His  body  simply  seemed  to 
streak  in  the  air.  A  motion  faster  than  a  wolf's  leap  can 
scarcely  be  imagined;  and  the  she-wolf  did  not  even  have 


104     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

time  to  throw  herself  on  the  defensive.  She  snapped  at 
the  dark  form  as  it  sped  past  her,  then  whirled  to  her  foster 
son's  defense. 

But  the  most  curious  thing  of  all  was  that  her  aid  was  not 
needed.  Shag  had  reflexes,  too,  as  finely  edged  as  those 
of  the  wolves,  and  without  conscious  thought  he  gathered 
to  meet  the  spring.  But  he  didn't  permit  it  to  strike  him 
squarely.  That  would  have  meant  an  instant's  disadvantage 
before  he  could  recover  from  the  force  of  the  impact.  He 
sprang  aside,  and  the  yearling's  body  only  brushed  his 
shoulder.  And  as  it  went  past  his  white  fangs  flashed  out 
and  buried  in  the  soft  flesh  of  the  yearling's  throat. 

There  was  no  second  leap  to  that  fight.  It  was  a  clean 
kill,  a  single,  unerring  bite  to  the  jugular  vein.  Although 
Shag  was  half  again  as  large  as  any  of  the  other  seasonal 
cubs,  the  yearling  had  outweighed  him  by  ten  pounds.  And 
the  old  gray  veterans  of  the  pack  wondered  among  them- 
selves. 

For  an  instant  all  individual  voices  were  drowned  out  in 
the  snarl  that  went  up  from  the  pack.  Perhaps  it  was 
the  smell  of  blood,  perhaps  only  the  excitement  that  sweeps 
like  a  fire  through  their  veins  at  the  sight  of  a  death  fight. 
Shag  stood  facing  the  pack,  shivering  with  fear,  yet  crouched 
and  ready  for  the  next  aggressor.  The  old  wolves  stood 
silent  in  the  moonlight.  And  the  she-wolf  was  crouched  in 
front,  ready  to  fight  till  she  died  for  her  foster  cub. 

A  gray  wolf  stalked  forward,  and  she  snarled  menacingly. 
But  he  made  it  plain  he  meant  no  harm  to  her  cubs.  He 
sniffed  at  her,  and  she  returned  the  caress.  Then  he  lifted 
his  nose  to  the  moon  and  howled. 

She  howled,  too.  The  pack  raised  its  voice.  Shag  never 
heard  such  a  sound  as  this  before.    It  thrilled  and  moved  him 


Shag  of  the  Packs  105 

beyond  any  experience  of  his  life.  It  was  the  very  voice 
of  the  wilderness,  sad  and  wild  and  strange  beyond  all 
simile. 

Then  the  pack  swung  on  up  the  ridge,  and  Shag  ran  with 
the  other  cubs.  But  the  evening  had  taught  one  lesson. 
His  whole  life  with  the  wolves  was  to  be  continual  strife, 
with  death,  soon  or  late,  at  the  end. 


Ill 

Although  he  did  not  know  it,  Lennox's  experiment  Tiad 
turned  out  well.  Shag  was  a  dog  with  a  wolf's  training, — 
a  wild  animal  with  the  instincts  of  domesticity.  He  had 
learned  the  ways  of  the  wild.  Above  them,  serene  and 
sure  as  a  strong  man's  courage,  he  had  the  penetrating,  cal- 
culating intelligence  of  a  dog. 

No  animal  ever  had  a  more  terrific  struggle  for  ex- 
istence. He  shared  all  the  dangers  of  the  wolf  pack  and 
was  at  perpetual  war  with  the  wolves  themselves  besides. 
Trap  and  poison  and  rifle  were  always  out  for  him.  He 
had  certain  handicaps — various  senses  that  generations  in 
domesticity  had  blunted,  and  structural  differences  that  les- 
sened his  endurance.  He  fought  for  the  right  to  run  with 
the  pack — a  fresh  battle  every  fall — and  he  killed  until  the 
wolves  whined  and  told  him  to  kill  no  more.  It  was  true 
that  he  could  have  hunted  alone.  But  such  a  course  never 
occurred  to  him.  He  had  grown  up  with  the  wolves,  and 
the  wolves'  ways  were  the  only  ways  he  knew.  In  the  fall 
he  fought  for  his  mate,  fight  after  fight,  until  he  con- 
quered. 

The  result  of  all  these  battles  was,  of  course,  an  ab- 
normal physical  development,  and  fighting  prowess  far  be- 


106    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

yond  any  of  his  gaunt  fellows  of  the  pack.  He  was  rather 
larger  than  most  of  the  wolves.  Trained  down,  without  a 
fraction  of  an  ounce  of  extra  flesh  on  his  gaunt  frame, 
he  weighed  a  full  hundred  pounds.  He  had  the  general  build 
of  his  shepherd  mother;  while  the  larger  breed  of  his  father 
gave  him  additional  strength  and  size.  He  had  a  beautiful 
bronze  coat,  his  mother's  intelligent  head  and  eyes,  a  splendid 
brush,  and  a  full-ringing  bay  that  could  announce  his  kill 
across  miles  of  silent  canon.  Above  all  things,  he  was  a 
fighter.  He  fought  after  the  wolf  fashion — lightning  spring 
and  recoil — but  he  put  into  his  battles  a  cold  intelligence 
and  cunning  that  would  overbalance  any  kind  of  a  physical 
handicap. 

He  lived  the  life  of  the  gray,  far-ranging  hunters  of  the 
ridges;  and  mostly  he  found  it  good.  He  delighted  in  the 
changing  seasons,  the  thrill  and  stir  of  spring,  the  long  hunt- 
ing twilights  of  summer,  and  the  fighting  days  of  fall.  The 
delight  when  the  pack  first  ran  together  was  always  new. 
He  loved  the  sense  of  resistless  strength,  of  grim  companion- 
ship, and  his  wild  heart  would  leap  and  threaten  to  burst 
at  the  wolves'  song  that  rose  and  fell  as  they  ran  along  the 
ridges.  He  loved  the  constant  battle,  the  realization  that 
his  own  prowess  alone  had  forced  himself  upon  the  pack. 

But  it  was  not  all  joy.  There  was  always  fear,  the 
heritage  of  every  beast  of  the  wild,  and  he  got  to  know  it 
very  well.  He  knew  cold,  too, — cold  that  dropped  down 
seemingly  from  the  farthest  stars,  cold  to  lock  the  eye- 
lids and  strike  dead  the  mountain  streams. 

The  wolf  cry  was  always  so  eerie  and  strange  over  the 
snow.  It  seemed  to  carry  so  far.  And  in  those  winter  days 
he  became  particularly  well  known  to  hunger.  These  were 
the  starving  times,  and  no  living  creature  that  passed  the 


Shag  of  the  Packs  107 

track  of  the  pack  was  safe.  All  forest  laws  turn  to  dust  in 
the  face  of  hunger.  Nothing  matters  then.  At  such  times, 
Shag  kept  close  watch  on  even  the  female  that  ran  be- 
side him.  He  didn't  know  when  her  sharp  fangs  would 
leap  for  his  throat. 

Except  for  one  thing,  Shag  would  have  been  content. 
Of  course,  that  means  something  far  different  from  the 
contentment  of  human  beings.  The  whole  tone  and  key 
of  the  wilderness  is  sad;  and  the  longer  a  naturalist  lives 
in  it,  the  more  unavoidable  becomes  this  fact.  There  is 
fear  and  cold  and  hunger,  and  the  constant,  tireless,  un- 
ceasing struggle  for  existence.  Of  course,  there  are  com- 
pensations; and,  perhaps,  one  night  of  such  exultation  as 
the  wolf  pack  knows  when  it  swings  along  on  the  elk  trail 
makes  up  for  a  whole  season  of  cold  and  hunger.  The  single 
exception,  in  the  case  of  Shag,  was  a  strange,  little-under- 
stood feeling  of  unfamiliarity  and  unrest  with  all  this  for- 
est life. 

There  was  one  sensation  that  was  always  returning  to 
him.  It  seemed  to  him,  as  he  hunted  through  the  thickets, 
that  some  dearly  beloved  companion  that  he  had  always 
known  had  just  been  lost  to  him.  The  companion  was 
never  another  wolf;  rather  it  was  a  tall  figure,  straight  and 
utterly  fearless.  There  was  an  actual  sense  of  loss,  of 
loneliness;  and  often  he  would  spend  long  hours  beating 
through  the  brush  in  search  of  this  lost  friend.  In  his 
dreams,  those  hunts  with  the  tall,  straight  form  were  par- 
ticularly frequent.  He  didn't  know  who  it  was.  He  only 
knew  it  was  some  one  very  brave  and  very  strong,  whose  will 
must  never  be  opposed. 

To  his  knowledge,  he  had  never  even  caught  sight  of 
human  beings.     Once  or  twice  he  was  dimly  aware  that 


108     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

some  unknown  breed  of  creature  lived  down  on  the  level 
spaces  along  the  rivers,  but  the  few  times  that  he  came  near 
enough  to  be  aware  of  them,  the  pack  would  desert  him 
and  flee.  They  always  seemed  so  afraid,  even  in  their  full 
strength.  It  was  a  curious  thing.  He  liked  to  feel,  par- 
ticularly in  the  autumn  time  before  the  winter  subdued  and 
humbled  him,  that  the  pack  need  fear  no  living  thing  that 
walked  the  earth.  Even  the  great  elk  fled  from  the  as- 
sembled wolves,  so  why  should  they  be  afraid  of  these  un- 
known creatures  in  the  valleys?  And  it  seemed  to  be  the 
worst  fear  of  all.  Even  that  of  the  forest  fire  was  secondary. 
He  had  known  the  pack  to  keep  its  formation  when  the 
forest  fire  roared  behind.  But  always  at  the  first  tart  smell 
on  the  wind,  an  icy  terror  seemed  to  get  into  all  their  num- 
ber. They  would  scurry  in  all  directions  and  leave  him 
wondering  on  the  hills  alone. 

He  began  to  have  a  devouring  curiosity  in  regard  to  them. 
The  smell  that  reached  him  was  not  greatly  different  from 
the  smell  of  a  forest  fire;  so  he  began  to  think  that  pos- 
sibly the  valley  was  inhabited  by  some  particularly  terrible 
kind  of  forest  fires.  And  this  wasn't  to  be  wondered  at, 
for,  of  course,  that  particular  smell  was  nothing  more  than 
the  smoke  from  chimneys.  More  than  once  he  determined  to 
climb  down  in  the  valleys  and  see  for  himself.  But  he  never 
had  quite  the  courage  to  do  it.  Of  course,  it  was  a  simple 
matter  of  fear  contagion,  imbued  from  his  fellows  of  the  pack. 

But  even  the  smell  of  the  wood  smoke  found  curious 
echoes  in  his  memory.  It  seemed  to  him  he  had  known  it 
always;  and  at  such  times  it  seemed  to  him  that  it  must 
not  be  so  terrible,  after  all. 

At  last  there  came  the  summer  when  he  saw  one  of  these 
inhabitants  of  the  valley.     And  he  knew  at  once  that  he 


Shag  of  the  Packs  109 

had  found  his  lost  companion, — the  tall  form  that  had  evaded 
him  in  the  thickets. 

It  was  a  midsummer  afternoon,  and  he  and  his  mate  were 
asleep  in  the  buckbush.  There  is  an  old  saying  that  a  wolf 
sleeps  with  one  eye  open.  Of  course,  it  isn't  literally  true; 
but  it  means  that  no  matter  how  deeply  he  is  asleep, 
he  is  always  ready  to  jump.  He  has  a  whole  range  of  re- 
flexes that  are  a  great  deal  better  than  automatic  burglar 
alarms.  Shag  and  his  mate,  at  the  same  fraction  of  the 
same  instant,  wakened  with  the  realization  that  some  liv- 
ing creature  had  approached  their  lair.  A  deer  would  have 
leaped  to  his  feet  in  panic,  perhaps  to  be  overtaken  by  a 
hunter's  bullet.  And  maybe  that  is  the  reason  that  the 
deer  are  becoming  extinct  in  regions  where  wolves  still 
flourish.  But  Shag  and  his  mate  were  not  deer;  so,  except 
for  the  faintest  stir  when  they  awakened,  they  crouched 
and  were  still. 

Both  of  them  saw  the  same  instant.  Usually  the  she-wolf 
waited  for  her  mate  to  decide  the  course  of  action.  This  time 
she  decided  herself.  She  began  to  steal  away  in  the  op- 
posite direction,  creeping  at  first,  then  trotting,  and  as  the 
wall  of  brush  grew  thick  behind  her,  running  at  top  speed. 

It  was  a  curious  thing.  Of  course,  he  was  frightened  him- 
self, at  first.  There  is  no  disease  in  all  the  world  so  con- 
tagious as  fear;  and  some  of  the  terror  that  his  mate  felt 
was  instilled  in  him.  But  at  once  a  more  tremendous  emotion 
got  the  better  of  it.  He  was  suddenly,  deeply  curious 
about  this  tall  figure  in  the  thickets. 

For  the  first  time  in  his  life  he  was  looking  at  a  human 
being.  It  was  the  tall  and  pretty  daughter  of  Silas  Lennox, 
sixteen  now,  and  quite  as  straight  as  the  pines  she  lived 


no    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

among.  She  was  climbing  the  ridge  on  an  errand  of  her 
father's. 

He  stood  trembling,  as  if  in  abject  terror.  And  he  didn't 
understand  that  sudden  fever  that  came  into  his  blood. 
He  felt  strangely  and  deeply  humbled,  even  more  than  when 
the  winter  sun  shone  on  the  expanse  of  snow. 

But  the  girl  did  not  look  at  him.  She  was  singing  to 
herself,  and  her  feet  tripped  lightly  over  the  carpet  of  pine 
needles.     In  an  instant  the  brush  crept  round  her. 

Shag  had  forgotten  his  mate.  He  only  knew  that  he 
must  keep  this  straight  form  in  sight.  He  must  not  lose  her 
again.  All  his  days  he  had  sought  her,  and  already  the 
brush  had  come  between.  Forgetting  his  mate,  forgetting 
his  danger  and  all  the  training  of  his  wild  days,  he  began 
to  creep  after  her.  He  went  softly  as  smoke,  shadowing 
her  with  all  his  cunning.  He  was  careful  to  keep  out  of 
sight  himself.  He  followed  her  by  sound  and  by  the 
occasional  glint  of  her  dress  through  the  thickets. 

Never  let  it  be  dreamed  that  he  was  hunting  her.  It 
was  not  blood  lust  that  propelled  him  upon  this  pursuit. 
It  was  an  emotion  he  had  never  known  before,  that  seem- 
ingly would  burn  him  to  dust  before  he  reached  the  end 
of  the  trail. 

The  girl  did  not  hear  him  at  all.  She  sang  her  way  to 
her  destination.  It  was  a  cabin  across  the  ridge  from  her 
father's  cottage,  and  a  woman  kissed  her  at  the  door. 
It  was  the  first  of  these  kind  of  lairs  that  Shag  had  ever 
seen,  and  he  made  a  slow  circuit  about  it  before  he  came 
to  any  conclusion  in  regard  to  it.  Then  he  decided  that 
his  earlier  opinions,  that  it  was  in  some  manner  connected 
with  forest  fires,  must  have  been  right.  There  was  smoke 
pouring  from  the  chimney.     But  his  emotion  was  only  awe, 


Shag  of  the  Packs  in 

not  fear.  And  he  settled  down  in  the  thickets  to  wait  for  the 
girl  to  reappear. 

He  waited  the  whole  night.  She  did  not  come.  His  mate 
whimpered  in  the  brush  behind;  but  at  first  he  did  not 
heed  her.  A  voice  was  calling  to  him  down  the  years,  clear 
and  distinct  through  ten  thousand  generations  of  dogs,  that 
could  not  be  denied.  It  was  an  obligation,  more  compelling 
than  the  call  of  the  wilderness  behind  him.  His  mate 
came  close  to  him,  and  tried  to  tug  at  his  shoulders.  But 
not  until  the  dawn  broke  did  he  waken  from  his  wonder- 
ing, longing  dreams  enough  to  turn  to  her. 

"Come  with  me,  Shag,"  she  seemed  to  be  saying.  "They 
are  not  our  people.  Come  with  me — the  hour  of  hunting 
is  here." 

"They  are  not  your  people,  true,"  Shag  might  have  an- 
swered her,  as  her  eyes  lowered  before  his.  "But  they 
are  mine.     I  have  found  them  at  last." 

The  dawn  broke  over  the  hills.  It  was  the  hunting  hour. 
And  already  the  glimpse  of  the  girl  in  the  thickets  had 
begun  to  partake  of  the  quality  of  a  dream, — such  a  dream  as 
he  had  had  so  many  times  before  of  trailing  some  straight 
figure  through  the  forests.  Perhaps  it  was  not  real  after 
all — and  the  deer  were  feeding  on  the  ridges.  So  he  turned 
and  followed  his  mate. 

IV 

In  the  ensuing  fall,  Shag  never  forgot  the  glimpse  of  the 
figure  in  the  thickets.  Even  in  mating  time  he  remembered 
her;  and  what  is  recalled  in  this  wild  season  must,  indeed, 
be  deeply  inscribed  on  the  memory.  Often  he  would  find 
himself  oppressed  with  strange  longings  and  desires  for 
which  there  was  no  relief,  and  often  he  made  long,  rest- 


112    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

less  journeys  through  the  thickets,  the  purpose  of  which 
he  hardly  understood  himself.  He  always  seemed  to  be  look- 
ing for  some  one, — some  one  whose  dress  would  flash  through 
the  buckbush,  and  whose  feet  would  trip  over  the  pine 
needles.  During  such  hunts,  he  would  often  let  the  deer  cross 
his  trail  without  even  glancing  at  them. 

It  was  a  busy  fall  for  the  forest  folk.  An  instinct  had 
whispered  to  them,  and  preparations  for  the  coming  winter 
seemed  more  than  usually  extensive.  The  gnawing  people 
were  particularly  busy.  They  enlarged  their  burrows  and 
worked  ceaselessly  to  pack  them  full  of  food.  The  in- 
dustry of  the  bees  was  a  thing  to  wonder  at.  Usually  they 
keep  close  to  their  trees  on  cloudy  days  and  stop  work 
as  if  by  a  union  order  rather  early  in  the  afternoon.  But 
now  they  worked  as  if  in  the  frenzy  of  starvation,  even 
into  the  twilight  and  the  cloudy  days  of  late  fall.  It  all 
portended  something.  And  at  first  Shag,  who  was  so  high 
on  the  scale  of  animals  that  he  had  lost  many  of  the  in- 
stincts that  are  the  guide  to  the  lower  peoples,  did  not  know 
what. 

Then  he  noticed  that  the  berry  crop  was  unusually  large. 
Old  Woof  was  delighted;  Shag  could  hear  his  contented 
grunts  every  time  he  passed  the  huckleberry  thickets.  It 
was  another  sign  pointing  to  the  same  conclusion.  The  flight 
of  the  waterfowl  was  exceptionally  early;  they  had  come 
and  gone  by  the  end  of  October.  In  the  first  of  November 
the  snows  came  to  stay. 

The  forest  creatures  did  not  worry.  They  are  not  made  of 
the  stuff  that  worries.  They  had  made  what  provision 
they  could,  and  if  this  didn't  avail  they  could  simply  die. 
There  were  none  from  whom  they  might  ask  help.  The 
snow  fell  unceasingly,  week  after  week.     The  deer  moved 


Shag  of  the  Packs  113 

down  to  the  lower  levels.  Many  of  the  other  wild  creatures, 
such  as  lynx  and  cougars,  followed  them;  and  no  doe  dared 
whisper  to  her  fawn  the  reason  why.  The  gnawing  people 
and  the  bears — who  really  are  just  sort  of  overgrown  rodents 
when  one  pauses  to  reflect — blinked  lazily  and  yawned  and 
went  into  their  winter  quarters.  That  meant  they  found  a 
snug  place  under  the  snow  and  went  to  sleep.  But  Shag  and 
the  pack  had  no  winter  quarters  to  go  to.  They  trusted  to 
their  furry  hides  to  protect  them  against  the  cold ;  and  some- 
times they  trusted  in  vain.  And  for  certain  reasons  the 
pack  did  not  dare  go  down  to  the  foothills.  The  settlers 
that  lived  along  the  rivers  were  in  no  mood  to  stand  any 
nonsense  from  wolves.  Too  many  times  they  had  heard  their 
sheep  bleat  in  the  night.  They  waged  a  relentless  war 
aganist  them,  and  the  wolves  had  learned  to  stay  out  of 
their  way.  The  time  was  to  come  when  hunger  would  re- 
move this  fear  of  the  valleys;  but  it  wouldn't  remove  their 
deep-seated  instinct  to  remain  on  the  high  plateaus. 

Southern  Oregon  is  really  a  very  temperate  climate.  The 
warm  winds  from  the  sea  keep  the  valley  green  as  a  garden 
throughout  the  winter.  But  they  die  away  on  the  snowflelds 
before  ever  they  reach  the  high  plateaus.  Then  the  snow 
deepens,  week  on  week,  until  the  tree  boughs  bend  with  it 
and  every  road  and  trail  is  covered. 

The  snow  ceased  in  December,  and  clear,  penetrating  cold 
came  instead.  It  froze  the  ice  on  the  lakes.  It  drove  away 
the  last  of  the  hardier  creatures  of  the  plateaus.  The  pheas- 
ants and  the  grouse  headed  down  into  the  oak-scrub  hill- 
sides. And  then  a  certain  familiar  spirit  began  to  walk 
about  the  snows.  The  familiarity  that  he  had  with  people 
has  become  more  distant  in  late  years,  but  yet  the  race  has 
very  good  memory  of  him.    And  the  wolf  pack  knew  him 


H4    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

particularly  well.  The  spirit's  name  was  Famine.  Evi- 
dently he  had  come  with  the  waterfowl  out  of  the  North. 
And  he  was  many  months  before  his  time. 

By  the  Christmas  season,  the  pack's  hunting  was  no 
longer  worth  the  effort.  There  was  simply  nothing  for 
them  to  kill.  Once  in  a  long  while  they  found  where  a 
grouse  was  buried  in  the  snow,  but  a  grouse  was  only  a 
bite  for  the  fortunate  wolf  that  seized  it  first.  And  one 
night  the  pack  fought  over  the  dead  body  of  a  porcupine, 
found  frozen  rigid  in  the  snow.  And  there  is  an  old  say- 
ing in  the  forest  that  when  a  pack  will  fight  for  the  body  of 
a  porcupine,  the  buzzard  will  feed  in  the  dawn! 

The  wolves  have  endless  endurance.  It  is  one  of  the 
marvels  of  the  animal  world.  They  lost  flesh,  their  ribs 
protruded,  but  still  they  kept  their  strength.  They  still 
covered  the  same  astounding  distances  in  their  hunting.  But 
there  was  a  change  in  them.  A  very  important  part  of 
them  was  lost  with  the  last  of  their  extra  flesh.  This  part 
was  their  timidity,  their  cowardice, — a  trait  that  has  always 
been  the  salvation  of  the  wolf  pack.  Sad  and  strange  was 
the  song  that  they  sang  to  the  winter  stars.  And  the  fear 
of  all  things,  except  death  in  the  shadow  of  famine,  was 
entirely  and  suddenly  gone  from  them. 

January  drew  to  its  bitter  close.  The  mountain  world 
was  lovely  in  its  snow,  a  sort  of  terrible  loveliness  even  in 
its  awesomeness  and  savagery.  The  wolves  crept  silently 
in  single  file  along  the  ridge  tops.  They  were  gaunt  and 
terrible,  and  their  eyes  were  swimming  in  curious  blue  fire. 
Shag,  the  hunger  madness  upon  him,  led  the  pack. 

The  sun  came  up  on  a  February  morning.  It  cast  a 
luster  on  the  world  of  snow.  A  girl's  bright  eyes  saw  it 
through  the  window,  and  it  called  a  promise  of  a  delightful 


Shag  of  the  Packs  115 

morning  for  skis.  Wrapped  in  her  mackinaw  and  leggings, 
she  was  not  afraid  of  the  cold.  She  did  not  even  dream 
that  such  a  spirit  as  Famine  was  abroad  in  the  snow,  par- 
ticularly this  early  in  the  winter.  True,  her  father,  Silas 
Lennox,  had  complained  of  the  absence  of  deer,  but  he  had 
brought  up  meat  from  the  valleys  below. 

She  dressed  quickly,  and  her  father  called  gayly  to  her 
as  he  built  the  morning  fires.  He  loved  the  look  of  her, — 
this  gaunt,  silent  man.  Tall  and  straight  as  a  reed,  yet  she 
had  begun  to  have  the  first  curves  and  grace  of  a  woman. 
Sixteen,  and  soon  she  must  be  sent  to  the  advanced  schools 
in  the  valley  below.  She  answered  his  call,  and  put  on  her 
skis. 

"Where  this  morning,  Snowbird?"  he  demanded.  "Not 
across  the  ridge  to-day?" 

"I  must  see  Nell — 'portant  business!"  she  assured  him 
solemnly.    Nell  was  a  girl  friend  that  lived  across  the  ridge. 

"And  you're  quite  certain  it  isn't  Nell's  good-looking 
brother!"  The  color  deepened  in  her  cheeks.  This  was  a 
young  mystery  in  itself.  One  wouldn't  have  thought  it 
possible,  touched  by  the  sunrise  as  she  was,  and  yet  it  was 
the  truth. 

She  fled,  light  as  a  creature  with  wings,  out  across  the 
snowdrifts  in  front  of  the  house.  Then  she  gave  him  a 
laughing  answer.  "I  don't  know  it's  entirely  safe,"  he 
commented,  as  he  turned  to  his  wife.  "But  what  can  you 
do,  with  a  snow  spirit  like  she  is.  She  won't  even  take  a 
gun " 

"But  who  would  harm  her,  in  these  mountains!"  the 
woman  replied.  She  understood  perfectly  the  instinct  that 
so  many  times  had  led  her  daughter  across  the  mountains 


n6    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

to  the  distant  cabin.  "The  wild  animals  are  all  cowards, 
and  she's  the  fastest  human  being  on  earth*on  skis." 

"All  the  same,  I  wish  she  had  a  dog.  I  wish  old  Shep 
was  alive;  or  that  little  pup  I  left  among  the  wolves!"  His 
thought  turned  back  to  the  spring  day,  almost  six  years 
before.  He  wondered  if  Shag  had  survived.  Once  he 
thought  he  had  caught  a  glimpse  of  him  in  a  distant  thicket, 
but  he  had  never  been  sure.  It  seemed  to  him  that  the 
experiment  had  not  been  justified,  after  all,  so  far  as  he 
himself  was  concerned.  There  had  been  little  opportunity 
to  study  the  wolf  dog,  after  the  first  spring.  He  turned 
to  his  morning  tasks. 

The  girl  continued  up  the  ridge.  She  gave  no  thought 
to  anything  but  the  tingling  beauty  of  the  morning.  It 
was  not  a  particularly  wise  thing  to  do.  One  of  the  moun- 
tain laws  is  to  keep  watch,  every  minute  of  every  hour,  and 
watch  the  trail.  The  girl  thought  she  knew  the  lay  of  the 
land  well  enough  to  find  her  way  straight  across  the  ridges. 
In  reality,  she  went  a  long  distance  out  of  her  way. 

Of  course,  she  could  not  see  the  trail,  covered  as  it  was 
by  snow.  She  relied  on  her  infallible  sense  of  direction.  And 
even  when  she  found  she  had  gone  three  full  miles  from  the 
path,  she  was  not  in  the  least  alarmed.  She  knew  the  way, 
her  young  limbs  were  tireless,  the  morning  was  clear  and 
bright  and  lovely,  and  she  headed  straight  on  toward  her 
destination.  She  walked  one  more  mile,  and  that  meant 
she  was  practically  halfway  between  the  two  homes. 

She  came  out  on  a  bare  hillside,  literally  miles  in  ex- 
tent. A  forest  fire  had  swept  over  it,  like  a  black  plague; 
leaving  only  at  rare  intervals  an  occasional  tottering  char- 
coal stump,  a  few  feet  in  height.  Of  course,  the  buckbush 
had  grown  up  in  the  half  dozen  years  since  the  fire,  but  the 


Shag  of  the  Packs  117 

snow,  eight  feet  deep  on  the  level,  had  completely  covered 
it.  It  was  a  place  that  Shag  might  have  remembered  clearly 
as  the  scene  of  his  first  fight. 

She  continued  on,  for  the  moment  relieved  to  come  out 
of  the  great,  silent  timber.  The  wide  plain,  unbroken  ex- 
cept for  the  drear  burned  palings  in  the  snow,  stretched  for 
a  sheer  ten  miles.  She  was  at  the  top  of  the  ridge  by  now ; 
and  the  rest  of  the  way  was  an  easy,  downward  slope.  It 
was  not  quite  steep  enough  for  coasting;  but  with  a  little 
effort  of  her  own  she  increased  her  pace  to  that  of  a  swift 
run.    It  was  skiing  at  its  best. 

The  grade  grew  less  steep,  and  she  slackened  her  pace. 
For  an  instant  she  stood  still  on  the  mountainside,  for  the 
first  time  aware  of  the  peculiar  depth  of  the  silence  through 
which  she  moved.  The  mountains  are  never  anything  but 
hushed  except  in  the  moments  of  forest  fire  or  storm;  but 
to-day  they  seemed  to  be  simply  buried  in  the  most  utter, 
breathless  silence.  It  was  a  dead  world,  this  mountain  land. 
The  snow  lay  deep  and  deep,  as  far  as  her  tiring  eyes  could 
see.  And  this  particular  burn  had  a  desolate  quality  that 
suddenly  appalled  her.  Famine  could  walk  here.  It  was 
just  the  kind  of  place  that  the  dread  spirit  would  choose 
for  its  abode. 

She  stood  still,  straining  at  the  silence.  She  could  hear 
the  stir  of  her  own  pulse.  And  then  she  hastened  on.  It 
was  still  miles  to  the  cabin ;  but  yet  surely  those  miles  would 
pass  quickly.  Nell's  tall  brother  would  walk  home  with 
her,  once  she  reached  her  destination,  and  the  two  of  them 
could  laugh  and  stop  to  kiss  in  the  very  middle  of  this  waste ! 
She  tried  to  hasten  her  step. 

And  at  that  instant,  loud  and  terrible  and  far-ringing 
through  the  silences,  the  wolf  pack  bayed  upon  her  trail. 


n8     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 


The  high  ridge  where  Snowbird  stood  would  have  made 
a  picture  that  would  be  exceptionally  hard  to  forget.  The 
desolate  snags,  the  miles  of  sunlit  snow,  the  girl  frozen  in 
her  tracks,  all  seemed  to  partake,  in  some  vague  way,  of 
the  quality  of  a  dream.  She  seemed  so  slight,  so  girlish, 
seemingly  so  fragile  in  the  face  of  this  sudden  expression 
of  wilderness  might. 

Yet  in  reality  she  was  very  brave.  It  is  not  easy  to  keep 
self-control  when  the  wolf  pack  bays.  It  is  one  of  the  most 
terrible  sounds  in  the  animal  world,  and  in  the  lower  crea- 
tures it  usually  induces  a  panic  that  leads  straight  to  death. 
Of  all  the  deadly  things  in  the  mountains,  to  lose  self-con- 
trol is  the  worst.  It  means  the  loss  of  sense  of  direction, 
of  cunning  and  intelligence,  and  thus  all  hope  of  escape.  Just 
for  an  instant  she  stood  still,  until  the  wild  cry  died  away. 
And  then  the  hardihood  of  spirit  that  life  in  the  mountains 
induces  came  to  her  aid. 

Her  gaze  leaped  behind,  then  made  a  slow  circle  about  her. 
And  she  was  face  to  face  with  the  truth.  There  were  no 
trees  that  she  could  climb  to  safety.  The  nearest  was  far 
beyond  the  desolate  stretch  of  burn,  seemingly  miles  dis- 
tant. The  few  burned,  tottering  poles  that  the  fire  had  left 
could  not  be  climbed,  and  if  they  could  they  would  not  bear 
her  weight.    One  thing  remained.    It  was  flight. 

And  even  flight  was  such  a  tragically  long  chance.  She 
did  not  permit  herself  to  hope  that  she  could  reach  the  big 
timber  before  the  pack  caught  up  with  her.  She  could  glide 
swiftly  on  her  skis,  but  they  could  come  more  swiftly  still. 
Her  one  hope  was  that  she  could  intimidate  them,  hold 
them  off,  until  she  could  reach  safety.     Life  had  got  down 


Shag  of  the  Packs  119 

simply  to  a  matter  of  whether  or  not  the  wolves  were  des- 
perate enough  to  attack  at  once. 

The  silence  pressed  about  her,  and  she  leaned  forward 
to  take  the  first  stride.  And  for  the  first  time  it  occurred 
to  her  that  possibly  all  her  fears  had  been  in  vain,  that 
the  wolf  pack  had  simply  crossed  her  trail  on  hunting  of  their 
own.     Once  more  she  glanced  back  to  the  top  of  the  ridge. 

But  it  was  only  an  instant's  hope.  For  in  the  swift  glance 
that  she  had  of  the  shoulder  of  the  ridge,  the  truth  came 
home  very  straight  indeed.  The  pack  had  surmounted  the 
crest.  She  saw  the  strange,  gaunt  forms,  seeming  abnor- 
mally large  through  the  clear,  thin  atmosphere,  in  sudden, 
startling  profile  against  the  snow. 

She  did  not  cry  out.  If  she  made  any  sound  at  all,  it 
was  just  a  gasp,  a  soblike  catching  of  the  breath,  that  the 
utter,  boundless  silence  swallowed  and  obscured.  She  knew 
what  mercy  she  might  expect  from  the  wolf  pack,  if  they 
attacked  in  the  snow.  The  color  was  struck  from  her  face. 
There  was  no  interlude  of  time.  It  vanished  with  the  speed 
of  light.  And  then  she  started  running  down  the  long  slope, 
faster  than  she  had  ever  skied  in  her  life  before. 

The  pack  was  running  by  scent.  Its  gray  members  swung 
along  in  single  file,  heads  low  to  the  ground.  A  great,  gaunt 
wolf  ran  in  front,  not  because  he  was  a  physical  superior 
to  Shag,  but  because  his  nose  was  keener.  Shag  came  next, 
his  burnished  coat  lustrous  in  the  sunlight.  And  the  gaunt 
fellows  followed,  wholly  silent  and  intent. 

There  was  a  quality  of  strangeness  about  this  chase.  The 
wolves  were  not  usually  so  silent.  The  reason  was  simply 
that  all  of  them  were  hovering  on  the  very  frontier  of  mad- 
ness. They  had  gone  hungry  too  long.  It  showed  in  the 
blue  fire  that  always  played  in  their  eyes,  in  the  way  they 


120    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

sometimes  whispered  and  growled  deep  in  their  throats,  in 
the  foam  that  often  gathered  about  their  terrible  fangs. 
With  Shag,  it  had  taken  the  form  of  dreams.  Night  after 
night  he  had  dreamed  of  the  tall  form  „  he  had  lost  and 
found  and  lost  again,  and  it  had  become  increasingly  diffi- 
cult to  distinguish  the  dreams  from  the  realities.  He  had 
heard,  again  and  again,  voices  calling  to  him  from  the  dark- 
ness and  the  thickets, — voices  that  were  full  and  strong  and 
commanding.    And  his  hunger  was  a  searing  fire  within  him. 

At  that  instant  the  gray  wolf  in  front  bayed  again,  a 
short,  hoarse  cry  that  all  of  them  understood.  He  had  caught 
sight  of  their  prey.  True,  it  was  too  distant  for  their 
short-sighted  eyes  to  distinguish,  but  any  living  creature 
was  game  in  these  starving  times.  His  cry  was  a  signal 
for  them  to  leave  the  trail  and  run  from  henceforth  by  sight. 
The  gray  body  seemed  to  stretch  out  and  he  fell  into  the 
long,  running  stride  that  is  the  age-old  terror  of  the  snow. 

At  once  the  whole  pack  leaped  from  the  file  and  ran  be- 
side him.  They  made  a  compact  little  body,  possibly  a 
dozen  wolves,  and  their  wild  voices  rose  in  the  hunting 
chorus.  It  was  not  the  same  sound  as  the  chanting  bay 
that  Snowbird  had  heard  before.  It  was  a  wild  frenzied 
bark,  without  rhythm  or  cadence,  from  every  wolfish  throat. 
They  were  in  sight  of  their  game,  and  the  blood  lust  was 
upon  them. 

Then  the  girl  cried  for  help.  The  sound  was  dim  and 
shrill  in  the  silence  of  the  wild.  And  there  were  none  to 
hear  or  to  heed.  The  forest  in  which  she  might  find  safety 
was  still  endless  miles  away.  She  sped  on,  and  it  is  true  that 
terrible  sobs  were  clutching  at  her  throat.  Now  she  could 
hear  the  beat  of  paws  on  the  snow  behind. 

The  wolves  were  so  close  now  that  they  could  hear  the 


Shag  of  the  Packs  121 

shrill  cry.  But  mostly  it  only  served  to  heighten  the  fever 
and  madness  in  their  blood.  They  knew  their  prey  now, — 
a  human  being,  such  as  they  had  always  feared.  But  there 
was  no  room  for  fear  in  their  savage  hearts.  Besides,  she 
was  weak  and  afraid.  They  could  hear  her  shrill  cry,  like 
the  bleat  of  a  deer  as  it  falls. 

She  had  turned  now  at  bay.  They  could  see  her  plainly. 
Again  and  again  they  heard  her  call,  an  unanswered  cry 
that  died  quickly  in  tjae  silence.  And  they  did  not  slacken 
their  pace  at  all. 

But  there  was  one  of  the  pack  whose  response  to  the 
girl's  shrill  cry  had  been  entirely  different.  Except  for  the 
madness  that  was  upon  them,  the  blur  and  the  haze  that 
was  over  their  fire-filled  eyes,  the  wolves  might  have  seen 
a  peculiar,  significant  change  in  the  attitude  of  one  of  their 
number.     That  one  was  Shag. 

The  voice  over  the  snow  found  a  curious  echo  in  his 
memory.  It  was  not  that  in  his  own  life  he  had  ever  heard 
such  a  call  before.  Rather  it  was  a  call  that  had  sung 
down  to  him  out  of  the  years,  out  of  the  thousands  of  gen- 
erations in  which  his  ancestors  had  been  the  servants  of  men. 
He  knew  that  voice,  vibrant  and  full, — the  voice  that  his 
breed  had  always  listened  for  and  heeded.  And  now  it 
had  a  strange  quality  of  distress  and  terror  that  moved  him 
to  the  depths  of  his  nature.  It  simply  seemed  to  tear  his 
heart  to  pieces.  He  didn't  consciously  know  it  was  a  call 
for  help.  If  he  realized  the  fact  at  all,  it  was  simply  an 
instinct.  It  wakened  strange  memories  and  desires  that 
were  buried  deep  in  the  labyrinth  of  the  germ  plasm,  an  in- 
stinct that  seemed  wholly  at  cross-purposes  to  all  his  wilder- 
ness training.  In  the  forest,  creatures  fight  their  own  fights, 
or  else  they  die.     Yet  the  call  awakened  an  impulse  that 


122     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

was  even  greater  than  the  first  law  of  the  forest,  that  of 
self-preservation,  for  he  knew  that  not  even  his  own  death 
must  stand  between  him  and  the  answering  of  that  call.  It 
was  an  obligation  that  could  not  be  denied. 

And  now  he  was  near  enough  that  he  could  recognize  the 
prey.  He  knew  that  tall  form,  the  compelling  eyes,  the 
throat  white  against  the  dark  hair.  It  was  the  same  form 
that  he  had  trailed  through  the  thickets  that  never-to-be- 
forgotten  day  in  the  fall,  and  for  which  he  had  waited,  out- 
side a  cabin,  the  whole  night.  It  was  his  old  dream  come  true 
again.  It  was  the  old  friend,  lost  to  him  so  long,  found  again. 
And  even  now  the  fellows  of  his  pack  were  springing  upon 
it,  to  tear  away  its  life. 

At  that  instant  Shag  seemed  to  go  mad.  He  had  seem- 
ingly been  running  his  fastest  before.  Now  he  simply 
darted,  faster  than  the  eye  could  believe.  He  did  not 
leap  for  the  girl.  He  knew,  even  better  than  he  knew  the 
fact  of  his  own  life,  that  he  must  die  before  the  fangs  of 
the  pack  must  be  allowed  to  tear  the  girl.  All  things  else 
had  ceased  to  matter.  One  of  the  great  gray  wolves  was 
even  now  leaping  for  her  throat,  and  Shag  had  sprung  to 
intercept  him  in  the  air. 

He  never  sprang  truer.  The  girl  had  thrown  up  her 
hands  to  protect  her  throat,  so  she  did  not  see  the  two  bodies 
meet  in  mid-air.  White  teeth  flashed,  tore  for  an  instant 
at  a  gray  throat,  and  the  wolf  and  the  dog  fell  together. 
The  wolf  did  not  get  up.  His  jugular  vein  had  been  torn 
like  so  much  paper.  But  Shag  sprang  without  an  instant's 
pause  at  the  second  of  the  wolves. 

The  creature  died  quickly.  There  was  not  even  a  mo- 
ment's battle.  Mad  with  his  blood  lust,  the  gray  wolf 
did  not  even  see  him  spring.     Again  Shag  whirled,  facing 


Shag  of  the  Packs  123 

the  oncoming  pack.    And  they  set  their  feet  and  slid  in  the 
snow. 

For  the  first  time,  the  girl  looked  up.  An  instant  before, 
her  clean,  young  soul  had  been  ready  for  death.  There 
had  been  no  hope.  Now  two  of  the  largest  of  the  pack 
lay  dead,  squarely  at  her  feet.  They  had  died  as  if  from 
a  blast  from  heaven,  in  utter  silence,  without  a  convulsive 
movement.  And  now  the  pack  was  face  to  face  with  a 
great,  shaggy,  lustrous-coated  dog,  a  savior  and  a  protector 
in  her  final  moment  of  need. 

She  didn't  try  to  understand.  She  saw  the  largest  of  the 
remaining  wolves  spring  to  one  side,  as  if  to  avoid  the  dog's 
fangs,  and  turn  again  toward  her.  But  Shag  whirled  with 
unbelievable  speed  and  intercepted  him.  Twice  the  white 
fangs  flashed,  then  the  dog  sprang  over  the  body  of  a  yearling 
to  intercept  a  young  male  that  was  rushing  the  girl  from 
the  rear.  The  cub  reached  the  girl's  body,  to  be  whirled 
away  by  her  own  splendid  strength,  but  the  young  male 
died  in  the  air. 

The  remainder  of  the  pack  surged  forward,  but  the  dog 
leaped  among  them.  This  was  no  ordinary  fighting.  He 
sprang  to  the  right  and  left,  backward  and  forward,  snap- 
ping, recoiling,  striking  with  shoulder  and  fang  and  claws. 
The  bewildered  wolves  struck  at  him  in  vain.  They  tore 
his  burnished  coat;  but  he  killed  in  return.  He  seemed 
imbued  with  the  speed  of  light  itself.  In  the  first  place, 
his  years  of  fighting  had  trained  him  for  just  such  a  battle 
as  this;  and,  in  the  second,  he  was  prompted  by  an  impulse 
more  potent  and  compelling  than  any  he  had  ever  known 
before. 

They  closed  around  him,  and  he  sprang  clear  and  darted 


124     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

after  the  girl.  His  instinct  was  to  protect  her,  not  simply 
to  kill  his  fellows. 

And  with  this  fight  the  battle  of  the  burn  came  to  a 
sudden  end.  The  remainder  of  the  wolves  gave  no  more  of 
their  thought  to  Shag.  Many  of  their  number  lay  dead 
in  the  snow,  and  it  is  one  of  the  most  hated  of  the  traits 
of  the  wolves  that  they  will  devour  their  own  mates  without 
compunction.  They  turned  with  hideous  ferocity  upon  the 
bodies  of  the  fallen. 

And  as  for  Shag?  He  was  bleeding  and  torn;  but  an 
exultation  was  upon  him  such  as  in  all  his  battles  he  had 
never  known  before.  He  had  found  his  lost  friend,  he  had 
fought  for  her  to  the  death,  and  he  had  conquered.  All 
the  long  trail  of  his  life  had  pointed  to  just  this  moment. 

He  knew  she  must  never  be  allowed  out  of  his  sight  again. 
He  felt  the  touch  of  her  hand  upon  his  head,  and  it  was  a 
glory  and  magic  that  stirred  and  enraptured  him  to  the 
roots  of  his  being.  Not  for  nothing  had  a  thousand  of  his 
ancestors  given  their  lives  and  services  to  men.  All  his 
life  they  had  spoken  to  him  through  his  instincts,  and  now 
he  had  heeded  them.    Shag  had  come  into  his  heritage  at  last. 


THE  SON  OF  THE  WILD  THINGS 

"Often  among  the  nations  a  child  is  born  seemingly  with  the 
blessings  of  the  wild  upon  him." — From  a  Frontiersman's  Diary. 

Beyond  the  cities  and  the  farm-lands  and  the  forests, 
beyond  the  last  trap  lines  and  the  farthest  trading  posts, 
in  a  region  where  white  men  do  not  go  and  the  North  Star 
almost  seems  no  longer  in  the  north,  a  long  bright  inlet 
stretches  from  the  uttermost  waters  of  Baffin  Bay.  It 
stretches  an  arm  into  a  strange  gray  land  that  in  the  minds 
of  white  men  is  simply  "the  Unknown." 

It  is  not  charted  on  the  mariner's  maps.  You  won't  find 
it  named  in  any  geography.  It  is  too  cold  for  the  forests 
to  grow,  and  the  rocky  valleys  and  the  towering  crags 
are  drear  and  bare  beyond  the  power  of  words  to  describe. 
The  green  ice  locks  down  on  the  waters  for  most  of  the  year. 
The  snow  comes,  foot  after  foot,  till  the  meager  shrubbery 
and  the  reindeer  moss  and  lichens  are  out  of  sight.  There 
is  never  any  sound,  in  winter,  except  now  and  then  the  soft 
step  of  the  wild  creatures  on  the  snow.  In  the  spring  the 
ice  breaks  and  churns  and  crashes  and  storms  with  a  noise 
more  terrible  than  a  hundred  thunderclaps  at  once;  but 
spring  does  not  mean  warm  weather  and  flowers.  Every 
day  in  the  spring  the  sun  rises  somewhat  higher  in  the 
south,  and  the  snows  begin  to  run  away  in  clear  rivulets, 
and  small  avalanches  rumble  on  the  crags,  and  here  and  there 
the  mosses  begin  to  show  above  the  snow.  But  not  until 
summer  do  the  flowers  come,   and  then  they  only  stay  a 


126     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

little  while.  They  are  hardy,  starlike  blossoms  that  sprinkle 
the  floors  of  the  valleys  with  color;  and  they  blossom  very 
bravely  and  gayly  until  the  frost  comes  again.  The  grass 
starts  up  too — for  Nature  is  a  persevering,  tireless  spirit. 
Except  for  the  weary  waste  of  crags,  the  region  in  sum- 
mer is  almost  beautiful.  But  summer  is  just  a  breath  that 
is  soon  gone.  The  soft  rain  turns  to  sifting  snow  in  early 
September,  and  the  winter  closes  down  on  land  and  sea. 

And  with  the  winter  comes  the  night  that  never  seems  to 
end.  It  is  not  the  kind  of  night  that  most  people  know, 
black  so  that  you  cannot  see  your  hand  before  your  face. 
Mostly  it  is  a  sort  of  deep  twilight,  wherein  a  snow-covered 
shrub  can  look  exactly  like  a  ghost,  and  a  wandering  caribou 
is  a  monster.  Nothing  seems  to  appear  in  the  correct  per- 
spective,— always  too  large  or  too  small,  or  too  near  or 
too  far.  Sounds  seem  too  loud,  or  else  just  a  whisper  much 
too  soft.  It  is  easy  to  imagine  all  kinds  of  things,  those 
winter  nights.  It  is  a  gray  land  of  ghosts  and  strangeness; 
and  any  dream — except  that  of  warmth  and  comfort  and 
mercy — can  come  true. 

The  Northern  Lights  play  above,  and  they  are  never  the 
same.  You  can  read  all  kinds  of  things  in  them  and  see  all 
manner  of  things  in  their  light.  Sometimes  they  are  just 
a  ruddy  glare  in  the  sky,  and  sometimes  they  waver  and 
shimmer  like  a  silk  flag  in  the  wind,  and  often  they  send 
queer  streams  and  splashes  of  fire  out  across  the  bowl  of 
the  sky.  They  are  red  and  purple  and  yellow;  and  some- 
times they  throw  a  green  glamor  over  all  the  land.  This 
is  the  worst  time :  when  the  green  light  is  on  the  snow,  the 
Innuits  know  that  starvation  and  death  and  maybe  worse 
things  are  coming  in  the  morning. 

It  is  very  easy  to  die,   in  this  place.     It  is  the  easiest 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    127 

thing  of  all  to  do.  To  live  at  all  means  constant  battle — 
not  six  or  eight  hours  out  of  twenty-four — but  almost  every 
moment  not  spent  in  sleep.  The  cold  knows  no  mercy.  To 
be  caught  in  it,  unprotected,  means  death,  very  quickly 
and  comparatively  gently.  There  is  a  moment  when  the 
blood  feels  oddly  warm,  and  then  the  Innuit  spirit  goes 
slipping  away  over  the  snow  to  the  dwellings  of  the  Arsissut. 
When  one  goes  there,  he  is  never  cold  or  hungry  any  more. 
But  if  he  has  been  a  bad  Innuit,  he  goes  to  another  place, — 
to  a  region  above  the  sky  where  it  is  always  cold  and  one 
is  always  hungry.  Then  there  is  starvation,  a  thing  never 
to  be  forgotten.  But  the  Innuits  do  not  worry  about  it 
till  it  comes.  And  finally  there  are  the  great,  gaunt  Arctic 
wolves  that  become  very  desperate  in  the  long  winter  nights. 

Even  the  Innuits  know  it  is  a  strange  land,  and  it  is 
their  home.  They  say  that  good  and  wicked  gods  are  al- 
ways battling  in  the  mists  just  beyond  their  sight,  and 
if  the  wicked  gods  win,  the  people  will  die.  Then  there 
are  the  torno  that  take  the  form  of  bears  and  seals — they 
ordinarily  live  in  the  rocks  and  trees — and  often,  in  the 
twilight  when  the  winter  air  is  electric  and  Aurora  Borealis 
dances  in  the  sky,  they  seem  to  move.  Then  there  is  Kusiifi- 
nek,  that  can  cause  sudden  sickness  or  death. 

But  the  white  people  to  the  south  should  not  call  this 
place  "the  Unknown."  There  are  a  number  of  creatures 
that  know  this  land  very  well. 

The  wild  geese,  for  instance,  that  come  in  such  queer 
wedges  from  out  of  the  South,  have  a  very  good  knowledge 
of  the  district.  They  know  which  ponds  are  half-choked 
with  tender  wild  rice,  and  which  have  only  pebbly  bottoms 
not  worth  exploring.  They  know  the  thickets  where  it 
is  safe  to  nest,  the  places  secure  from  the  stealthy  onslaught 


128    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

of  wolves.  You  can  hear  them  drearily  honking  a  kind  of 
mournful  ode  to  the  bleak  land  beneath  them.  They  come 
when  the  snows  melt,  and  no  one  can  count  their  numbers. 

Even  the  puffins  have  a  fair  idea  of  the  place.  They  sit 
all  day  on  the  rocks,  and  they  always  seem  very  wise  with 
their  heads  erect  and  in  their  judicial  attitudes.  In  reality 
they  are  very  foolish.  Even  the  women — the  placid 
kenmeiaf  that  chew  die  skins  all  day  in  the  huts — can  till 
their  sealskin  sacks  with  puffin  whenever  they  choose. 

Of  course,  what  the  wolves  know  of  the  place  would  fill 
many  volumes  the  size  of  this  book.  Since  they  cannot  talk 
to  people,  no  one  will  ever  know  how  vast  and  complex 
this  knowledge  is,  but  the  Innuit  respect  is  enough  to 
follow  the  wolf  pack  when  his  tribe  is  starving;  the  wolves 
nearly  always  take  him  to  game.  Darkness  means  nothing 
to  the  wolves.  They. can  kill  a  seal  beside  one  of  ten 
thousand  inlets  that  look  exactly  the  same,  sing  through 
the  valleys  for  forty  miles  that  night,  and  return  to  it  straight 
as  a  light-shaft  the  next  day. 

The  polar  bear  knows  the  region  too;  and  he  has  an 
advantage  over  the  wolves  in  that  he  is  a  marvelous  swim- 
mer. He  can  swim  out  and  explore  the  many  crags  and 
islands  that  outcrop  in  the  straits;  and  it  is  true  that  human 
explorers  often  find  him  riding  like  a  castaway  on  a  great 
fragment  of  iceberg  far  from  shore.  Then  there  are  the 
caribou,  wandering  for  endless  miles  over  uncharted  roads 
and  never  going  astray;  the  long-haired  musk-ox,  seemingly 
very  awkward  and  slow,  but  nimble  and  fleet  as  a  mountain 
goat  when  he  wishes  to  be;  the  seal  that  come  up  out  of 
the  sea  and  breed  and  fight  on  the  beaches;  and  the  be- 
whiskered,  cross  old  walrus  that  can't  ever  quite  make  up 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    129 

his  mind  whether  he  is  a  land  animal  gone  to  sea,  or  a 
marine  creature  that  now  and  then  likes  the  feel  of  solid 
earth  beneath  his  flippers.  These  things  are  no  strangers 
in  the  land.  They  know  more  about  it  than  all  the  ex- 
plorers of  the  next  hundred  years  can  possibly  find  out. 
The  youngest  caribou  in  the  herd  knows  things  that  Admiral 
Peary  died  without  learning ;  and  that  is  saying  a  great  deaL 
And  lastly,  the  little,  happy  Innuits  know  it  too. 

They  are  little  only  in  comparison  with  the  Anglo-Saxon. 
Many  of  them  are  good  size,  often  reaching  five  feet  ten 
in  height,  and  occasionally  one  grows  to  a  full  six  feet. 
They  are  just  as  large  as  the  Indians  that  make  war  upon 
them  from  the  south,  and  considerably  more  attractive  as 
neighbors.  What  they  lose  in  height,  they  make  up  in 
girth — for  the  Innuit  appetite  is  a  tradition.  Innuit  means 
simply  "the  people"  in  Eskimo  talk,  and  surely  they  are  the 
only  people  that  the  great,  bleak  region  knows.  And  in 
spite  of  the  bitter  lessons  that  gave  them  their  knowledge 
— the  lessons  of  cold  and  hunger  and  dire  necessity — they  are 
always  happy.  Of  all  that  strange  land,  this  is  the  strangest 
thing  of  all.  They  eat  and  laugh  and  hunt  and  sleep  and  tell 
a  ghost  story  or  two  and  laugh  some  more;  and  this  is  all 
they  care  about  doing.  They  haven't  been  close  enough  to 
the  white  men  to  learn  how  to  lie;  and  they  thoroughly 
believe  their  own  ghost  stories.  One  can  believe  almost 
anything  in  that  twilight  land,  where  the  boulders  take  to 
rolling  down  the  hills  of  their  own  accord.  Besides,  a 
ghost  would  be  no  stranger  than  a  thousand  other  things 
in  the  strange  place.  Since  they  have  never  learned  to  steal, 
either,  they  never  have  had  consciences  to  make  them  un- 
happy. 


130    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

But  it  takes  time  to  acquire  knowledge;  and  the  female 
musk-ox  that  came  browsing  along  a  snow  river  with  her 
calf  was  too  young  to  know  many  of  the  wiles  of  these  same 
Innuits.  He  was  her  first  calf,  and  she  was  filled  with  de- 
light at  the  sight  of  him.  True,  he  was  a  sleek,  handsome 
little  creature  to  be  the  son  of  such  a  homely  mother.  The 
musk-oxen  are  not  given  to  beauty  at  any  time.  They  are 
not  much  bigger  than  a  fair-sized  pony,  about  eight  feet 
long  and  nearly  four  feet  high.  They  have  stort,  sturdy 
legs  and  a  little  sawed-ofr  sheeplike  tail.  Indeed,  some  nat- 
uralists are  inclined  to  think  that  the  musk-oxen  have  far- 
off  blood  ties  with  the  sheep ;  and  they  arrive  at  this  conclu- 
sion not  only  from  the  tail,  but  from  a  certain  uninteresting 
conformation  of  the  skull.  They  can  climb  as  well  as  any 
mountain  sheep,  an  attribute  not  generally  possessed  by  the 
oxen,  and  they  are  agile  and  speedy  to  a  degree  that  is  simply 
astonishing.  But  they  certainly  are  homely  and  ungraceful 
and  broad-faced.  Their  hair  drapes  about  them  like  fine 
shawls  of  Cashmere,  often  three  feet  long.  But  the  calf  was 
just  as  graceful  and  pretty  as  a  Jersey;  he  had  big,  gentle 
eyes  and  a  sturdy,  agile  little  body. 

They  were  browsing  along  a  rivulet  that  had  sprung  from 
a  melting  snow  bank  farther  up  the  slope;  and  in  the 
magic  of  the  May  sunlight  they  had  forgotten  that  there 
could  be  such  a  thing  as  danger.  The  cow  cropped  the  new 
grass,  and  now  and  then  browsed  at  the  moss  that  grew 
in  the  shelter  of  the  rocks.  The  calf  romped  about  her, 
now  and  then  nosing  at  her  udder  and  trying  to  squeeze 
beneath  her  belly. 

Then  the  thing  occurred.  What  had  seemed  a  firm, 
rich  bed  of  moss  and  lichens  suddenly  gave  way  under  her 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    131 

feet,  and  she  went  down  with  a  bellow  of  terror.     She  had 
stepped  squarely  into  a  reindeer  pit. 

These  pits,  perhaps  the  most  primitive  manner  of  secur- 
ing meat  in  existence,  are  dug  by  the  Innuits  and  covered 
with  a  fragile  netting  of  twigs  and  moss.  They  differ  from 
the  pits  used  in  taking  bear  and  wolf  only  so  far  that  they 
have  no  impaling  stake  at  the  bottom,  for  sometimes  it 
is  well  to  take  a  reindeer  alive.  In  an  instant  the  ox  was 
lying,  shaken  but  unhurt,  in  the  floor  of  the  pit,  and  an 
escape  from  its  depths  was  simply  out  of  the  question. 

II 

Death  was  a  common  thing  in  the  little  Innuit  settle- 
ment beside  the  inlet;  and  the  women  took  the  word  of 
what  was  happening  in  Tweegock's  hut  of  skins  without 
astonishment  or  comment.  Dark  days  were  on  the  settle- 
ment, it  seemed. 

A  few  nights  before,  the  North  Lights  had  been  green, 
and  they  might  have 'known  some  evil  would  befall.  The 
Eskimo  people,  while  intensely  superstitious  and  believing 
in  a  whole  race  of  deities  or  torno,  are  in  a  measure  fatalists, 
and  nothing  seems  to  matter  one  way  or  another. 

It  had  been  an  unhappy  spring.  They  were  just  a  frag- 
ment of  a  tribe,  and  they  had  become  separated  from  the 
remainder  in  the  preceding  autumn.  They  had  been  going 
south  in  their  great  oomiacs,  or  skin  boats,  and  by  the  cir- 
cumstances of  a  sudden  gale  and  freeze,  one  of  the  boats 
had  been  compelled  to  make  a  landing  apart  from  the  rest. 
In  it  were  perhaps  ten  adults.  Only  by  utmost  cooperation 
can  life  be  sustained  in  that  frozen  country,  and  ten  were  too 
few  to  achieve  the  best  results.  And  now  one  of  the  ten 
was  dying.  TmiJs  * 


132    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

It  was  Tweegock's  wife.  She  lay  on  a  pile  of  skins  in 
his  hut,  and  a  little  brown  newborn  baby  was  in  her  arms. 

"I  am  going  to  the  land  of  the  Arsissut — very  quickly," 
she  told  her  husband.  "But  I  leave  you  a  child — a  man 
child,  such  as  was  never  born  in  this  place  before." 

She  showed  him  the  brown-skinned  baby.  It  was  a  virile, 
active  little  creature;  and  Tweegock  could  see  that  it  was 
physically  perfect.  Never  did  a  newborn  have  such  sturdy 
legs  and  arms,  such  a  strong  little  back.  Eskimo  women 
do  not  often  die  in  childbirth;  perhaps  the  unusual  size 
of  the  baby  was  the  explanation  in  this  case.  The  man 
looked  at  it  with  pride. 

"But  you  will  take  him  too,"  Tweegock  replied  in  sorrow. 
"There  is  no  milk.  None  of  the  women  have  young  babies. 
He  will  die  in  a  day." 

Suddenly  her  black  eyes  seemed  to  be  full  of  light,  and 
she  half  raised  herself  on  her  elbow. 

"He  will  live,"  she  told  him.  "The  blessings  of  a  tornac 
is  upon  his  head.     I  know.    I  have  seen." 

By  that  she  meant  that  there  was  a  guardian  spirit  that 
would  take  care  of  her  little  son.  When  one  of  the  Innuits 
has  a  guardian  tornac — a  sort  of  private  deity  in  which  the 
Eskimos  believe  absolutely — no  ice  can  crush  him,  no  cold 
freeze  him;  and  the  wolves  flee  when  he  looks  them  in  the 
face.  The  man  bent  down  lower,  and  his  little  eyes  seemed 
very,  very  wide.  He  believed  her  wholly.  Surely,  at  the 
border  of  the  realm  of  Arsissut,  she  could  tell  him  only  the 
truth. 

"The  tornac  came  in  the  shape  of  a  bear,"  she  told  him. 
"A  white  bear — for  he  sniffed  at  the  tent  just  as  the  babe 
was  born." 

This  fact  did  not  surprise  Tweegock  in  the  least.    As  all 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    133 

Innuits  believe,  a  tornac  can  take  the  shape  of  any  animal, 
or  a  stone  or  tree,  for  that  matter,  at  will. 

"The  bear  came  up  from  the  coast  and  sniffed  at  the  tent," 
the  woman  went  on.  "It  means  that  the  wild  things  are 
his  friends.  They  will  not  kill  him  when  they  meet  him  on 
the  snow.  They  will  find  his  milk  for  him  too.  He  is  born 
to  be  the  brother  of  the  bear — and  the  wolf — and  the  musk- 
ox.    And  we  will  name  him  Nenook — the  bear. 

"I  know  it,  Tweegock!  The  bear  sniffed,  and  I — I 
heard  it  speak,"  her  voice  ebbed  away;  and  she  had  but  a 
moment  more  of  life.  The  man  bent  so  that  his  ear  was 
close  to  the  woman's  lips.  Of  course,  she  had  heard  the 
bear  speak — for  did  not  often  the  torno  speak  through  the 
lips  of  beasts?  And  the  woman,  in  the  delirium  that  is 
the  frontier  of  death,  believed  she  was  telling  him  the  truth. 

"  'This,'  the  bear  said,  'is  the  son  of  the  wild  things,'  " 
the  woman  whispered.  "Those  were  the  words:  'This  is 
the  son  of  the  wild  things.  He  is  a  child  of  the  ice  floe — 
and  the  mountains — and  Mucktuf  (the  caribou)  'on  the 
plains,  and  the  musk-ox  in  the  valleys.  He  will  know 
their  secrets,  and  the  wild  will  suckle  him.'  These  were 
the  white  bear's  words,  my  husband. — And  I  die!" 

She  did  die.  Even  as  Tweegock  knelt  beside  her,  her  life 
sped  away.  And  he  soberly  went  to  tell  the  other  mem- 
bers of  the  little  settlement  what  his  wife  had  said. 

They  nodded  their  heads  very  wisely.  "Follow  the  tracks 
of  the  tornac  that  came  as  a  bear — and  he  will  find  milk 
for  the  child,"  they  said.  "Without  milk  the  babe  will  die, 
for  none  of  our  wives  have  young  at  their  breasts.  Go  into 
the  wild,   Tweegock,   before  hunger  comes  on  the  babe." 

Tweegock  and  his  older  son,  a  boy  of  twelve,  started 
out  together.     There  seemed  nothing  strange  to  anyone  in 


134    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

the  departure.  The  two  would  find  the  tornac — the  spirit 
that  had  spoken  through  the  lips  of  the  bear ;  and  somewhere 
in  the  rocky  waste  they  would  find  substance  to  keep  the 
child  alive.  They  trusted  absolutely.  They  carried  their 
spears  and  bird-darts,  however,  for  although  the  tornac  was 
friendly,  they  did  not  feel  like  meeting  him  unarmed.  Both 
were  rather  wide-eyed  and  silent,  and  their  cheeks  were 
flushed  so  that  their  fellow  tribesmen  could  see  the  red 
through  the  brown.  It  is  an  exciting  thing  to  seek  spirits. 
Anything  in  the  world  might  befall  them  before  they  re- 
turned. 

"We  may  go  to  the  Arsissut  too,"  they  said. 

They  followed  the  track  of  the  bear  that  had  spoken 
to  Tweegock's  wife,  and  the  trail  led  them  over  a  ridge 
and  into  a  valley.  They  walked  in  silence,  one  behind 
the  other.  Although  neither  of  them  cared  to  mention 
the  fact,  they  held  their  harpoons  ready  to  fling  at  an  in- 
stant's notice.  The  snow  was  mostly  gone,  and  the  track- 
ing would  have  been  practically  impossible  to  an  Anglo- 
Saxon.  But  these  two  little  brown  Innuits  followed  it 
with  ease. 

"We  are  getting  nearer,"  Tweegock  said  at  last.  "Soon 
we  will  find  him  waiting — and  perhaps  he  will  talk  to  me 
too." 

His  son  nodded  gravely;  and  they  began  to  follow  up  a 
little  snow  river  that  rippled  down  from  a  snow  bank  to 
the  sea.    And  then  they  came  in  sight  of  the  bear. 

Both  of  them  gasped  a  little;  and  Tweegock's  hand 
trembled  as  he  pointed. 

"It  is  waiting,"  he  said.     "I  will  go." 

For  the  bear  did  seem  to  be  standing  still  as  if  undecided 
which  of  two  impulses  to  obey.      Usually  the  white  bears 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    135 

fled  at  first  sight  of  an  Innuit,  but  on  this  occasion 
there  was  a  particular  reason  why  he  wanted  to  remain.  It 
wasn't  that  he  had  any  remarks  to  make  to  Tweegock.  It 
was  simply  that  just  a  hundred  feet  distant  a  very  large  and 
attractive  dinner  was  lying  in  a  pit  in  the  ground.  Musk- 
oxen  with  calves  as  a  rule  are  game  too  dangerous  to  be 
attractive;  but  this  time  the  ox  seemed  helpless  to  protect 
herself  or  her  calf.  But  the  two  Innuits  were  drawing 
nearer;  and  the  bear  decided  that  the  musk-ox  would  have 
to  wait  till  later.  So  he  fled  on,  up  the  stream,  and  vanished 
about  the  white  shoulder  of  the  snow-bank. 

In  a  moment  more  the  Innuits  were  beside  the  pit. 
Within  it  was  a  young  cow  musk-ox  with  a  calf;  and  for  a 
long  time  they  gazed  with  glowing  eyes. 

"A  musk-ox — with  milk  in  her  udder!"  the  man  cried 
at  last.  "Milk  for  my  baby — just  as  the  tornac  said.  I 
will  stand  guard,  and  you  will  bring  the  men  of  the  tribe 
with  ropes.  And  the  babe  shall  live  to  rule  all  this  land — 
and  the  wolf  will  lick  his  leggings,  and  Tuk-tuk"  (the  rein- 
deer) "will  kneel  at  his  feet."  Then  his  gaze  fell  on  the 
little  musk-ox  calf  that  bleated  pitifully  from  the  other 
side  of  the  pit.  "And  see,"  the  man  cried,  "this  little  one 
shall  be  his  brother — nursed  at  the  same  breast." 


Ill 

"I  will  name  him  Kayak — because  he  can  be  ridden  like 
a  boat,"  said  little  Nenook  to  his  father. 

Old  Tweegock  nodded  gravely.  He  never  disputed  his 
little  son.  He  was  always  just  a  little  bit  afraid  of  him. 
Every  member  of  the  tribe — for  several  years  before,  the 
little  band  of  Innuits  had  become  united  with  the  remainder 


136     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

of  the  tribe — knew  the  story  of  Nenook,  how  he  had  thriven 
on  musk-ox  milk,  and  how  the  creatures  of  the  wild  were 
his  friends.  Even  the  priest,  who  claimed  to  talk  with  spirits 
daily,  watched  the  boy's  growth  with  some  measure  of 
awe.  For  never  in  the  history  of  the  people  had  there 
been  such  a  thing  as  an  Innuit  boy  and  a  musk-ox  calf 
being  brothers  at  the  same  breast. 

The  cow  had  never  really  submitted  to  domestication, 
and  in  a  hard  winter  of  six  years  before  she  had  been  slain 
for  food.  It  had  been  the  occasion  of  a  sacred  feast,  wherein 
the  priest  had  marked  the  child's  breast  with  her  blood. 
Her  bull  calf  Kayak  was  not  domesticated  either,  as  far 
as  the  tribe  was  concerned.  Indeed,  he  was  just  as  wild 
a  musk-ox  as  ever  ranged  the  region  of  the  inlet.  But 
he  was  none  the  less  little  Nenook's  companion  and  slave. 

They  had  grown  up  together.  They  had  drunk  of  the 
same  strong  milk,  and  almost  died  together  the  following 
winter  in  one  of  the  "starving  times"  that  every  so  often 
come  upon  the  Innuits.  They  had  been  playmates  when 
Kayak  was  a  wabbly  calf  and  Nenook  had  not  yet  learned 
to  walk.  They  had  romped  together  through  the  summer 
days,  and  in  the  fall  the  calf  had  been  taken  with  the  dogs 
in  the  southerly  expeditions  after  salmon  and  birds. 

He  was  a  wild  creature,  and  so  was  Nenook.  In  the 
very  beginning  the  people  saw  that  his  mother's  prophecy 
was  coming  true.  He  did  not  play  with  other  Innuit  boys 
— slow,  chubby  little  fellows  in  sealskins,  who  had  patient, 
uninteresting  games  outside  their  mothers'  huts.  In  the 
first  place  they  were  all  afraid  of  him.  His  daily  rompings 
with  the  powerful  calf  had  developed  his  muscles  far  be- 
yond all  natural  limits  of  a  boy  of  his  age,  and  he  soon 
learned  that  he  must  play  gently  with  them.     They  were 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    137 

not  even  strong  enough  to  afford  him  sport.  Nor  did  he 
remain  in  huts  and  help  chew  the  skins  with  the  other  chil- 
dren. 

They  were  outlaws  from  the  very  first, — the  ox  and  the 
boy.  Both  were  magnificent  specimens.  Of  course,  the 
beast  was  full-grown  when  Nenook  was  still  a  slender  boy; 
but  for  all  that,  Nenook  was  the  master.  The  little  touch 
of  domestication  in  the  life  of  the  ox  had  strengthened 
rather  than  weakened  him.  Perhaps  he  kept  in  better  con- 
dition because  of  more  regular  food.  In  the  winter,  par- 
ticularly, the  musk-oxen  suffer  from  hunger,  as  every  mouth- 
ful of  reindeer  moss  must  be  probed  for  in  the  snow.  Kayak 
had  a  man  calf  with  a  man's  keen  and  crafty  brain  to  look 
after  him,  and  he  gained  weight  in  winters  wherein  many 
of  his  breed  had  died.  Every  year  he  had  grown  heavier, 
stronger,  longer  of  hair  and  surer  of  foot.  He  stood 
four  feet  at  the  shoulders,  and  that  is  the  absolute  limit 
for  the  musk-ox.  He  was  nine  feet  long  from  the  end  of 
his  three-inch  sheeplike  tail  to  the  extremity  of  his  nose, 
and  he  had  never  had  occasion  to  measure  his  strength. 
When  he  stood  off  in  the  wind,  and  his  long  hair  blew  about 
him,  he  seemed  like  a  ragged,  fringy  thing  of  no  shape 
at  all. 

Most  of  the  Innuit  boys  are  thickly  built  and  short  and 
awkward;  and  they  have  fat  little  stomachs  always  calling 
for  more  tuck-tu  or  seal  blubber.  Nenook  was  not  like  this 
at  all.  He  was  proportioned  like  a  Greek  athlete;  and  his 
muscles  did  not  knot  and  bunch  like  those  of  the  mounte- 
banks that  lift  hollow  weights  upon  the  stage  in  the  United 
States.  They  were  smooth  and  rippling  and  scarcely  notice- 
able; and  they  were  strong  as  steel  wires.  He  had  such 
muscles  as  may  be  found  in  the  thigh  of  a  wolf,  or  the  jaws 


138     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

of  a  hyena.  He  had  black  hair  that  grew  long  about  his 
shoulders,  and  his  skin  was  a  deep  chestnut,  rather  than 
red  or  copper.  And  he  was  taller  than  any  boy  of  his  age 
by  half  a  foot. 

He  was  simply  a  wild  creature,  and  he  had  the  strength 
and  stealth  and  cunning  that  the  wild  creatures  have.  From 
the  very  first  he  had  no  interest  in  the  circle  of  huts  where 
his  people  lived.  In  the  summer  he  would  sooner  have  gone 
to  sleep  in  the  cold  sea  than  in  the  huts  of  his  people.  It 
wasn't  that  he  had  any  nonsensical  ideas  about  fresh  air.  It 
was  just  that  he  couldn't  breathe  at  all  in  the  sweat-box 
tents.  For  the  Innuit  people  light  their  lamps  and  carefully 
cut  out  the  least  bit  of  air,  and  simply  cook  themselves  the 
whole  night.  They  lie  half-asphyxiated  in  the  carbon  dioxide 
from  the  lamps,  and  they  gasp  all  night  like  fish  out  of  the 
water.  It  doesn't  hurt  them  a  great  deal,  but  nevertheless 
Nenook's  lungs  hadn't  become  adapted  to  that  sort  of  treat- 
ment. He  was  accustomed  to  running  a  matter  of  fifteen 
miles  down  the  valleys  in  a  single  afternoon,  the  ox  gallop- 
ing along  beside  him,  and  his  lungs  absorbing  air  as  a  seal 
consumes  fish, — in  large  quantities.  So  when  the  sleep  time 
came,  he  and  the  ox  would  go  out  .to  the  encircling  #hills, 
and  they  would  fall  to  sleep  wherever  fancy  dictated.  Some- 
times it  was  a  soft  bed  of  moss,  and  sometimes  it  was  simply 
a  hard  shelf  of  a  cliff.  But  if  it  were  too  hard,  the  boy 
had  no  scruples  whatever  against  using  the  great  body  of 
the  ox  as  a  mattress.  If  the  beast's  hide  had  mud  caked  in 
it,  the  fact  did  not  matter.    The  Innuits  aren't  squeamish. 

They  would  start  together  in  the  dawn;  and  the  air 
stirred  their  blood  like  wine.  The  people,  harnessing  for 
the  seal  hunts,  would  see  them  start  away;  and  the  sight 
always  made  them  utter  little  wondering  grunts  and  whis- 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    139 

per  together.  And  if  the  truth  must  be  told,  Nenook  took 
a  boyish  delight  in  mystifying  these  good  people.  He  him- 
self wasn't  in  the  least  mystified.  It  came  just  as  natural 
to  him  to  run  through  the  valleys  beside  a  lumbering  ox 
as  for  his  far-removed  small-boy  cousin  in  the  United  States 
to  take  an  all-day  jaunt  with  his  dog.  It  came  perfectly 
natural  to  him  to  learn  to  steal  like  a  shadow  over  the 
rocks  in  search  of  game,  or  to  trace  a  polar  bear  to  its  lair, 
or  laugh  at  the  wolf  pack  from  a  cliff  top. 

They  would  run  until  the  boy  was  tired,  and  that  might 
be  anywhere  from  ten  to  twenty  miles.  Running,  for  his 
smooth  muscles,  took  no  more  effort  than  walking.  There 
were  no  cliffs  that  these  companions  did  not  visit,  no  caverns 
they  did  not  explore,  no  steppes  that  they  did  not  traverse. 
They  knew  the  hills  as  the  wolves  knew  them.  The  seal 
had  no  more  intimate  knowledge  of  the  shore  than  they. 
They  knew  the  swamps  and  lakes  as  the  geese  knew  them. 
And  all  the  time  the  boy  was  growing  lither  and  more  grace- 
ful and  swifter  of  limb;  and  the  bull  was  growing  heavier 
and  craftier  and  stronger.  And  when  tired  the  boy  would 
climb  on  his  broad  back,  and  half  go  to  sleep  while  the 
ox  loped  back  with  him  to  the  settlement. 

But  Nenook  had  enough  sense  of  responsibility  to  the 
tribe  to  learn  to  be  a  hunter.  They  had  fed  him,  in  his 
babyhood,  and  he  must  pay  the  debt.  By  now  he  had 
learned  to  steal  like  a  wolf  upon  a  flock  of  geese  and  strike 
to  the  right  and  left  before  they  could  get  on  their  wings; 
or  lie  still  as  a  figure  of  stone  above  the  stream  and  strike 
down  like  a  whiplash  when  a  salmon  passed  beneath.  But 
he  did  not  permit  the  other  boys  of  the  tribe  to  learn  hunt- 
ing secrets  that  he  did  not  know.  He  would  go  to  the  ice 
floe  with  the  men,  and  with  a  little  practice  he  could  hurl  a 


140    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

harpoon  almost  as  swiftly,  and  quite  as  accurately,  as  an 
American  can  shoot  a  rifle  bullet. 

Almost  before  he  knew  it,  he  was  the  best  hunter  in  the 
tribe.  He  was  still  a  slender  boy ;  and  in  the  United  States, 
where  boys  grow  up  slowly,  he  would  have  been  a  mere 
child.  But  the  craft  of  hunting  came  as  naturally  to  him 
as  running  or  sleeping.  What  other  Innuits  had  to  learn  by 
constant  practice,  he  knew  by  instinct.  He  could  track  a 
bear  where  the  others  could  see  but  a  naked  stone.  He 
knew  just  how  to  operate  one  of  those  long-tailed  harpoons, 
ingeniously  equipped  with  a  bladder  to  wear  out  the  strug- 
gling seal  and  hold  him  up  after  death.  He  could  kill  more 
birds  with  his  hands,  or  with  swift  pebbles,  than  could  the 
other  Innuits  with  their  darts.  And  he  was  a  master  with 
the  rib-bow — the  most  deadly  weapon  the  Eskimo  pos- 
sesses. 

"You  must  learn  the  use  of  all  weapons,"  his  father  told 
him.  "Sometime  you  may  meet  the  Red  People,  and  unless 
you  are  swift  of  limb  and  strong  of  arm,  the  women  will 
never  hear  you  come  singing  back  again." 

IV 

All  his  life,  so  it  seemed,  Nenook  had  heard  of  the  Red 
People.  They  were  the  Indians  that  lived  to  the  south, 
against  whom  the  Innuits  had  been  at  eternal  war.  The 
two  peoples  had  a  traditional  hatred  for  each  other;  and 
when  they  met  on  the  salmon  streams  or  the  caribou  trails, 
they  always  fought  to  the  death. 

But  the  Innuits  tried  hard  not  to  meet  them.  The  Red 
People  always  outnumbered  them,  three  or  four  to  one; 
so  as  a  rule  they  contented  themselves  by  praying  to  the 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    141 

torno  to  send  death  and  starvation  upon  them.  But  the 
torno  did  not  usually  oblige  them.  The  Red  People  lived 
in  more  favorable  regions  to  the  south,  and  always  they 
seemed  to  increase  as  the  Innuits  died. 

"But  why  can  we  not  go  and  kill  them  one  by  one," 
Nenook  would  ask.  "Are  we  children — or  babies — or  simply 
puffins  on  the  rocks?  Must  we  submit  to  their  murders 
until  there  are  none  of  us  left?" 

But  the  older  men  would  laugh  at  him  a  little,  and  re- 
mind him  he  was  but  a  child.  Only  his  father,  the  strong 
heart  of  the  tribe,  agreed  with  him.  Yet  the  others  did 
not  like  to  be  reproached  on  this  point.  The  very  name 
of  the  Red  People  filled  them  with  dread. 

"Wait  till  you  are  as  old  as  we,  Nenook,  and  you  will 
see,"  they  said.  "We  cannot  battle  them.  They  are  too 
many." 

But  Nenook  did  not  know  what  the  words  "too  many" 
meant.  He  knew  enough  of  the  wild  to  realize  that  any 
advantage  can  be  overcome  by  stealth  and  planning.  And 
he  always  jumped  up  and  down  with  rage  at  the  sight  of  his 
fellow  tribesmen  standing  in  little  groups  and  gazing  with 
frightened  eyes  and  pale  faces  to  the  south. 

He  did  not  know  the  runners  had  reported  that  a  tribe 
of  the  Red  People  were  migrating  north,  with  the  inten- 
tion of  driving  the  Innuits  from  their  caribou  trails  be- 
side the  Lower  River. 

The  wilderness  is  a  book  of  knowledge  with  an  infinite 
number  of  pages,  and  the  more  of  them  Nenook  turned  over, 
the  more  amazed  he  was  at  the  number  that  remained.  It 
was  the  only  book  that  Nenook  ever  saw;  for  the  Innuit 
people  are  too  busy  to  care  about  printed  books.     Every  day 


142     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

he  learned  new  lessons  of  the  valleys  and  hills  and  waters. 
The  wild  things  grew  accustomed  to  the  sight  of  him,  lop- 
ing along  beside  the  ox,  or  else  riding  on  the  broad  back,  and 
they  began  to  think  about  him  as  simply  a  member  of  the 
wilderness  clan.  They  did  not  regard  him  as  a  man  child. 
Even  the  polar  bear,  great  white  creature  that  is  one  of  the 
nobility  if  not  the  king  himself  of  the  wild  places,  regarded 
him  with  some  measure  of  tolerance.  Nenook  had  no  fear 
of  him;  and  he  pretended  to  have  no  fear  of  Nenook.  But 
nevertheless,  somewhere  in  the  back  part  of  his  small-sized 
brain,  he  was  perfectly  aware  that  if  it  came  down  to  cases, 
Nenook  was  his  master. 

The  wolves  pursued  him  only  once.  There  was  quite  a 
pack  of  them, — a  half-dozen  rangy,  gaunt,  savage  creatures 
who  were  accustomed  to  having  men  and  beasts  flee  from 
their  path.  The  boy  and  the  musk-ox  ran  speedily  awhile,  and 
the  wolves  loped  joyfully  along  on  the  trail  behind.  But 
all  at  once  their  prey  turned  and  faced  them. 

This  was  out  of  accordance -with  the  nature  of  things. 
Usually  the  musk-ox  did  not  turn  to  fight  until  further  flight 
was  impossible.  The  men  they  had  chased  at  various  times 
never  stopped  at  all  until  they  reached  their  huts.  These 
two  had  come  to  bay  squarely  in  the  open  prairie;  and 
they  turned  so  suddenly  that  the  wolves  were  almost  upon 
them  before  they  could  check  their  flight. 

Kayak  handled  two  of  the  pack.  He  caught  one  of  them 
on  his  horns,  and  the  thing  that  came  down  looked  more 
like  a  rag  than  a  wolf.  The  other  he  struck  with  his  fore- 
feet, and  churned  back  and  forth. 

Nenook's  attack  had  been  somewhat  different.  First  he 
had  thrown  his  harpoon ;  and  one  of  the  gray  crowd  had 
been  impaled  and  fastened  to  the  earth  like  a  bird  on  a  thorn. 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    143 

Then  before  they  could  rush  or  attack,  he  had  driven  in 
three  arrows  from,  his  rib-bow. 

Two  of  them  went  home  with  curious  deadliness  and 
silence.  The  last  wolf  leaped  aside  just  in  time.  The  others 
had  died  so  suddenly  and  swiftly  that  they  had  not  even  had 
time  to  howl.  And  the  only  sound  he  heard  as  he  fled 
away  was  a  musk-ox  bawling  his  triumph,  and  a  lean  Innuit 
boy  hurling  savage,  laughing  taunts  at  him  as  he  danced 
among  the  fallen. 

Sometimes  the  musk-ox  went  with  Nenook  on  the  hunt, 
and  sometimes,  while  Kayak  grazed,  they  took  different 
trails.  Sometimes  the  two  would  have  little  sealing  parties 
beside  the  ice  floes,  for  Kayak  had  been  trained  to  carry 
a  bleeding  seal  on  his  broad  back  just  as  swiftly  and  easily 
as  the  dogs  could  transport  it  on  a  sledge.  They  more  than 
paid  for  the  food  and  raiment  Nenook  procured  from  the 
tribe. 

Nenook  learned  the  secret  habits  of  all  the  wild  creatures. 
No  man  in  the  North  knew  more  of  the  caribou  runs  than 
he.  The  ways  of  the  great  caribou  herds  is  still  a  profound 
mystery  to  many  naturalists.  They  have  certain  lanes  and 
passes  that  they  take  through  the  dreary,  snow-swept  land, 
and  they  can  usually  be  counted  on  to  return,  year  after 
year.  If  an  Innuit  once  learns  these  passes,  he  knows  just 
where  to  wait  for  his  winter  store  of  meat. 

Every  year,  in  the  late  summer,  they  would  encounter  the 
musk-ox  herds,  and  day  after  day  Kayak  would  wander 
with  his  breed.  At  such  times  his  master  either  hunted  at 
the  edge  of  the  herds,  or  else  remained  with  his  tribe.  When 
the  breeding  season  was  past,  however,  Kayak  was  always 
content  to  go  back  to  the  old  happy  life  of  roaming  and 
playing  and  hunting  with  his  master. 


144     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

As  yet  Nenook  had  never  encountered  the  Red  People; 
but  he  had  heard  enough  of  them  to  hate  them  beyond  any- 
thing in  the  world.  He  did  not  hate  the  wolves  that  hunted 
him,  or  the  polar  bears,  or  any  of  the  remorseless  creatures 
of  the  wild.  But  these  Red  People — they  did  not  kill  for 
meat.  They  murdered  for  spite.  It  was  their  pleasure  to 
catch  various  Innuits  far  from  their  tribe  and  kill  them  in 
terrible  ways.  Nenook's  eyes  would  light  and  his  strong 
hands  would  clench  at  the  tales  his  people  told  of  them.  And 
he  could  never  understand  why  they  did  not  take  their  rib- 
bows  and  their  harpoons  and  settle  the  matter,  once  for  all. 

But  the  time  was  to  come  when  Nenook  should  have 
a  personal  debt  to  pay  to  the  Red  People.  And  that  was 
the  first  great  war  of  Nenook's  life. 

He  had  been  gone  from  the  encampment  a  full  week. 
He  had  been  on  one  of  his  long,  wandering  expeditions  with 
Kayak,  and  all  at  once  he  had  remembered  the  smell  of 
the  oil  lamps  and  the  drone  of  his  father's  voice  as  he  sat 
about  a  pot  of  blubber  and  told  ghost  stories.  He  was 
not  so  inured  to  the  wild  but  that  he  occasionally  suffered 
from  homesickness.  And  all  at  once  he  had  sprung  up  from 
a  bed  of  moss  and  loped  off  homeward.  The  musk-ox  sprang 
up  and  followed  him. 

They  ran  in  silence,  mile  after  mile.  And  at  last  they 
reached  the  settlement. 

The  people  called  to  him  as  ever  as  he  passed  their  huts; 
but  their  voices  hardly  seemed  the  same.  They  had  a  hesi- 
tant, strained  quality  that  he  was  at  a  loss  to  understand. 
Usually  they  flung  good-natured  gibes  at  him,  but  to-night 
no  one  laughed  at  all.  Of  course  some  sorrow  had  come 
over  the  village.     But  yet  the  lamps  were  burning  brightly, 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    145 

as  in  times  of  plenty;  and  there  was  no  evidence  of  plague 
or  disaster.    They  acted  as  if  it  concerned  him,  too. 

He  drew  up  to  a  walk;  and  it  was  a  queer  thing  to 
see  him  traversing  the  stretch  of  beach  with  bowed  head 
and  puzzling  eyes,  and  the  hulking  ox  trailing  at  his  heels. 

"What  is  it?"  he  asked  the  first  man  he  saw.  "What  has 
happened  ?" 

But  the  man  evaded  him  and  turned  his  back.  Nenook 
was  more  bewildered  than  ever.  Then  he  saw  his  older 
brother  waiting  at  the  door  of  the  hut. 

The  man  was  standing  with  bowed  head,  and  the  cus- 
tomary smile  was  gone  from  his  lips.  His  eyes  seemed  dark, 
too,  and  strange. 

"What  is  it?"  Nenook  demanded.  "What  has  happened, 
Brother?    The  people  all  act  so  strange." 

"You  are  a  wicked  son  of  beasts,  or  you  would  have  been 
here  to  learn,"  the  brother  answered.     "Tweegock  is  dead." 

Tweegock  was  Nenook's  father;  and  for  a  moment  he 
could  not  believe  that  he  would  never  hear  his  droning  voice 
again.  Then  the  tears  came.  He  flung  himself  down  on 
the  bed  of  skins,  weeping  inconsolably  and  miserably.  He 
had  not  even  been  in  the  hut  to  watch  the  spirit  depart  to 
the  realm  of  the  Arsissut!  His  weeping  was  very  real  and 
very  bitter;  for  even  these  remote  savages  of  the  uttermost 
North  know  human  emotion  and  love. 

"And  how  did  he  die?"  Nenook  asked  at  last.  "Did  the 
ice  break,  or  was  it  Awwk"  (the  walrus)    "or  sickness?" 

For  a  long  moment,  the  older  brother  did  not  reply. 
Nenook  looked  up  from  the  pile  of  skins.  And  at  once  he  was 
on  his  feet.  For  the  man  had  turned  his  back  to  him  and  was 
gazing  soberly  out  the  door  of  the  hut.  He  seemed  oddly 
embarrassed  too. 


146    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

"How  did  he  die?"  Nenook  demanded  again.  "Tell  me, 
my  brother!  If  it  was  the  wolves,  I  will  trace  them  down 
— one  after  another " 

All  at  once  the  brother  turned  and  spoke  with  odd, 
strained  tones.  "It  was  not  the  wolves,"  he  replied.  "It 
was  not  sickness — or  Awuk — or  the  ice.  He  was  bird  snar- 
ing in  the  south." 

"The  south "  Nenook  echoed.     His  heart  seemed  to 

catch  fire  within  him,  and  he  grasped  his  brother's  arms  with 
his  strong  hands.    "Tell  me!    Was  it  the  Red  People?" 

The  other  slowly  nodded.  "There  is  a  tribe  of  them — 
one  hundred  or  more — come  up  to  the  Lower  River,  and  a 
dozen  of  their  men  came  upon  him  at  once.  They  killed 
him,  and  left  him  lying  by  the  sea." 


The  boy  who  went  from  tent  to  tent  and  asked  that  the 
full-grown  men  gather  with  him  in  the  council  tent  scarcely 
seemed  the  same  long-haired  forest  creature  that  had  come 
loping  down  into  the  encampment  in  the  twilight.  All 
at  once  he  seemed  more  like  a  man  than  a  boy.  The  lines 
of  his  face  were  like  black  slashes  made  by  a  knife;  and 
the  placid  dark  eyes  of  the  Innuits  do  not  usually  have  such 
fire  in  them  as  burned  out  of  his.  The  men  came,  wonder- 
ing. 

They  stood  in  a  little  group  in  the  tent,  and  Nenook's 
older  brother  talked  to  them.  "This  wild  son  of  my  father 
that  has  come  back  wants  us  to  go  to  war,"  he  said.  "He 
has  called  us  cowards,  and  children  and  women.  He  wants 
us  to  take  our  spears  and  go  down  into  the  south — and 
avenge  my  father." 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    147 

They  shuffled  and  grunted  together,  but  for  a  while  none 
of  them  spoke. 

"It  is  useless,"  the  oldest  man  among  them  said  at  last. 
"What  can  a  handful  of  us  do  against  a  hundred?  Our 
men  must  stay  away  from  the  south.  Tweegock  went  where 
the  wisest  of  us  advised  him  not  to  go,  and  he  dies.  There 
is  nothing  that  we  can  do." 

Nenook  jumped  up  and  down  with  rage.  "Are  you 
women?"  he  demanded.  "Are  you  not  the  men  who  kill 
the  walrus  and  track  the  wolf?  Bah,  even  the  polar  bear 
would  do  more  than  you !  Kill  his  mate,  and  he  will  follow 
you  to  the  hut.  Would  you  sit  still  and  have  our  men  killed 
one  by  one?" 

"You  are  just  a  boy,"  they  told  him  patiently.  "We 
are  men,  and  we  know  we  cannot  fight  against  the  wind 
and  sea;  neither  can  we  combat  one  hundred  to  our  two- 
score.    You  are  a  boy,  and  your  tornac  is  a  demon." 

"Men!"  Nenook  sneered.  "If  you  are  men,  let  me  be 
a  beast!"  No  one  can  be  more  scathing  than  the  savage 
people  when  they  wish ;  and  Nenook's  tongue  was  like  a  lash. 
"Even  Nenook,  for  whom  I  was  named,  would  not  sit  still 
in  his  lair  and  let  his  breed  be  slain!  Bah!  Go  back  to 
your  women." 

They  filed  away,  and  for  a  long  time  the  boy  sat  be- 
side the  lamp.  His  face  worked,  his  hands  clenched  and 
his  heart  was  almost  ready  to  break  open  with  fury  and 
hatred.  He  trembled  as  if  the  cold  was  on  him.  And  all 
the  time  his  keen  young  mind  grappled  with  the  hardest  prob- 
lem he  had  ever  been  called  upon  to  solve. 

The  tribe  was  at  least  a  score  or  two  against  one  hun- 
dred ;  and  yet  the  men  were  afraid  even  to  attempt  vengeance. 
He  was  only  one  against  a  hundred,  and  he  had  not  yet 


148     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

got  his  growth.  Yet  he  had  learned  the  value  of  craft. 
He  knew  what  cunning  and  forethought  might  do  against 
even  tremendous  odds.  The  lessons  that  he  had  learned 
in  the  wilderness  stood  him  in  good  stead.  And  all  at  once 
he  sprang  up. 

His  brother  had  been  watching  him  from  the  doorway; 
and  presently  they  were  face  to  face.  He  hardly  knew 
his  younger  brother.  The  passion  and  the  madness  were 
gone  from  him;  and  he  was  more  like  one  of  the  wild  crea- 
tures on  the  track  of  its  prey.  He  seemed  singularly  lithe 
and  calm,  and  he  moved  with  peculiar,  stealthy  grace.  His 
eyes  had  been  red.     Now  they  were  filled  with  white  light. 

The  older  man  fell  back  a  pace.  "Kina?"  he  exclaimed. 
("What  is  it?")     "You  are  not  a  man  child,  but  a  wolf!" 

Nenook  laughed  softly ;  but  his  older  brother  did  not  meet 
his  eyes.  "Give  me  the  wolf's  strength — just  for  a  single 
night!"  he  replied.  He  laughed  again,  an  odd  sound  that 
filled  the  hut  like  the  chortle  of  a  goblin.  "Mark  my  words, 
brother.  And  now  tell  me — why  are  the  Red  People  camp- 
ing by  the  river?" 

His  brother  did  not  understand  at  first,  and  Nenook  had 
to  repeat  the  question. 

"They  are  waiting  for  the  caribou,"  the  man  replied. 

It  was  just  as  Nenook  had  thought.  He  remembered  per- 
fectly the  Lower  River,  and  he  knew  that  a  certain  great 
herd  of  caribou,  out  of  the  waste  lands  to  the  west,  always 
followed  the  source  of  its  water  on  their  southern  migra- 
tions. The  Red  People  were  simply  waiting  for  them  to 
come  so  as  to  procure  a  winter  store  of  meat.  The  caribou, 
as  all  men  of  the  North  know,  are  a  large  breed  of  deer 
that  comprise  the  greater  part  of  the  animal  population  of 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    149 

the  Barren  Lands.  They  wander  in  vast,  shadowy  herds 
and  comprise  the  Innuits'  chief  source  of  meat. 

"And  what  if  they  did  not  come?"  Nenook  whispered. 
His  lips  curled,  and  his  brother  could  see  his  white  teeth. 

"But  they  always  do  come.  They  will  be  there  within 
a  day  or  two  at  most.  You  remember,  Nenook!  The 
herd  comes  through  the  We-we  Pass,  where  the  Lower 
River  circles  through  the  narrow  gap  in  the  mountains,  and 
from  thence  they  follow  the  River." 

"But  if  they  should  not  come — the  Red  People  would 
die!" 

"Yes — many  would  die,  and  the  few  that  remained  would 
have  to  move  their  quarters.  It  grows  late,  and  it  would 
be  a  mighty  task  before  the  snow  comes.  But  the  caribou 
will  be  upon  them  soon.  They  are  due  now;  and  never  are 
they  more  than  five  days  late." 

"And  the  We-we  Pass  is  over  the  rocky  hills — a  trail 
that  no  man  may  go  in  the  cycle  of  the  moon!"  Nenook 
laughed  again,  savagely,  and  all  at  once  he  seized  a  seal 
harpoon  from  the  rack  that  held  it  above  his  head.  It  had 
the  thong  and  the  inflated  bladder  at  the  end.  "Listen, 
brother,"  Nenook  went  on.  "Will  you  help  me — just  for 
a  single  day?  I  cannot  linger  to  do  this  thing  myself.  Per- 
haps I  am  too  late  now.  You  are  skilled  with  berry  juice 
and  brush.    I  want  you  to  write  a  letter." 

The  only  letters  that  the  Innuits  could  write  were  of 
course  just  series  of  pictures;  but  some  of  the  tribesmen 
possessed  considerable  skill  at  drawing  these.  "There  is  no 
joy  in  vengeance  that  is  not  recognized  as  vengeance,"  Ne- 
nook whispered.  "The  Red  People  must  know  who  it  is 
that  strikes,  or  the  blow  is  wasted.  That  is  the  message 
you  must  send.     You  must  come  in  the  night  and  throw 


150    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

the  spear  into  their  settlement.  They  will  know  it  is  an 
Innuit  spear.  And  on  the  bladder  you  will  portray  the 
murder  that  they  did — beside  the  sea.  And  then,  with 
your  own  skill,  let  them  know  that  they  will  pay  for  it 
with  their  own  blood!"  The  boy  began  to  dance  up  and 
down  in  his  hatred.  "Every  man  and  every  woman  and 
every  child.  Their  dogs  will  die  in  the  snow.  Their  lamps 
will  burn  out.  That  is  what  you  must  tell  them  in  the  letter, 
brother — and  I  go!" 

Going  to  his  own  hut  Nenook  hacked  out  a  great  piece 
of  frozen  blubber,  and  swung  it  in  a  bird-skin  sack  over 
his  shoulder.  He  took  his  rib-bow,  too,  and  his  harpoon. 
In  a  moment  more  he  was  standing  beside  the  musk-ox, 
his  dark  face  to  the  west. 

"Where  do  you  go?"  his  brother  asked.  "Remember 
— you  are  still  a  boy." 

"My  manhood  has  come  upon  me  in  a  day — but  I  did 
not  find  it  here,"  Nenook  answered.  "I  go  to  make  war 
on  the  Red  People — just  Kayak  and  I." 

The  first  part  of  the  journey  was  no  trial  whatever  to 
the  strength  of  either  of  them.  They  were  used  to  running 
out  across  the  valley;  and  even  the  wild  creatures  that  saw 
them  come  gave  them  scarcely  a  second  glance.  The  boy 
ran  in  front,  easily,  swiftly;  and  the  ox  thundered  be- 
hind. With  his  short  legs  and  heavy  body,  the  creature 
seemed  to  move  with  great  expenditure  of  energy;  but  in 
reality  running  was  an  easier  task  to  him  than  to  his  master. 

The  wild  geese,  circling  endlessly  overhead,  saw  them 
come;  and  they  honked  down  a  greeting.  Once  the  wolves 
fled  from  their  path;  and  once  a  small  herd  of  musk-ox, 
grazing  in  the  darkness,  looked  after  them.  They  went  up 
from  the  sea,  toward  the  high  range  of  moonlit  crags. 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    151 

Both  man  and  beast  were  saving  their  strength  the  best 
they  could.  They  rested  at  intervals;  for  no  one  knows 
better  than  the  wild  creatures  how  much  time  can  be  gained 
by  an  occasional  rest.  At  such  times  they  relaxed  utterly. 
"My  great  Kayak!"  Nenook  cried.  "Thank  my  tornac  for 
your  muscles  and  your  strength." 

The  night  was  still  young  when  they  came  to  the  hills. 
They  were  not  such  hills  as  tourists  climb  in  the  United 
States.  They  had  no  roads,  marking  the  easier  grades, 
and  the  only  trails  they  had  were  narrow,  winding  pathways 
made  by  the  feet  of  the  wild  creatures.  These  hills  seemed, 
indeed,  quite  impassable. 

The  two  halted  at  the  base  of  the  hills,  and  Nenook 
stroked  the  great  neck.  "It  is  your  work  from  now  on, 
great  Kayak!"  he  said.  "Brother,  it  all  depends  on  you. 
I  cannot  run  over  these  hills.  Only  your  sure  feet  can 
carry  me." 

Then  he  leaped  on  the  broad  shoulders,  and  the  tortuous 
ascent  began. 

The  hills  were  strange  and  still  in  the  darkness.  They 
were  inexpressibly  bleak ;  and  the  two  seemed  to  have  all  their 
tremendous  spaces  to  themselves.  On  other  night  rides 
they  had  felt  the  constant  presence  of  the  wild  life  in  the 
shrubbery  and  the  grass  and  over  them  in  the  air.  There 
were  usually  wolves  and  bear  and  musk-oxen ;  and  the  whole 
nation  of  little  creatures, — rodents  and  foxes  and  ermine. 
But  these  hills  seemed  to  be  absolutely  bare  of  life.  There 
were  no  puffins  on  the  rocks.  There  was  only  silence,  and 
the  Northern  Lights  in  the  sky,  and  the  shadow  of  dreary 
crags. 

The  Innuits  said  that  only  spirits,  and  evil  ones,  at  that, 
inhabited  these  hills.     Nenook  could  readily  believe  it. 


152     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

Yet  his  mount  was  especially  fitted  for  such  a  run  as 
this.  Its  feet  were  as  sure  as  a  mountain  goat's,  and  it  had 
wonderful  agility  besides  its  strength.  The  many  miles  they 
had  already  come  did  not  seem  to  affect  it  in  the  least. 

"Kayak!"  he  urged.  "Brave  brother!  You  will  win 
for  me  yet!" 

The  beast  was  choosing  its  own  trail.  Nenook  lay  close  to 
the  broad  back,  lessening  wind  resistance  as  much  as  he 
could.  The  moon  was  out,  and  its  light  blended  strangely 
with  the  flickering  bars  of  the  Aurora  Borealis. 

They  were  in  the  high  mountains  now.  They  encircled 
great  beds  of  snow,  and  they  traversed  trails  so  narrow  that  it 
seemed  no  living  feet  could  cling  to  them,  and  they  skimmed 
the  edges  of  great  gorges  full  of  the  moonlight.  Once 
a  fissure  in  the  rock  barred  their  trail,  and  a  sob  caught  at 
Nenook's  throat.  But  the  next  instant  he  cried  out  in 
triumph,  for  his  mount  had  taken  it  in  one  leap. 

The  strength  of  the  creature  was  ebbing  now.  The  eyes 
were  wide;  the  horns  seemed  to  flash;  the  nostrils  were  red. 
It  had  been  a  test  of  strength  that  a  musk-ox  never  endured 
before.  No  mountain  pony  could  have  possibly  covered  the 
same  trail  in  a  like  number  of  hours.  Even  the  reindeer 
had  not  the  sure  feet  and  the  agile  body  for  such  a  climb. 
The  musk-ox  partook  of  the  qualities  of  the  sheep  as  well 
as  the  oxen  clan;  and  to-night  his  sheeplike  traits  stood 
him  in  good  stead. 

But  the  journey  was  almost  over.  They  were  descend- 
ing now.  The  dawn  was  breaking;  they  could  see  the  gleam 
of  the  waters  of  the  Lower  River  as  they  flowed  through 
We-we  Pass. 

And  they  were  none  too  soon.  For  the  first  thing  they 
saw,  when  the  dawn  came  out,  was  what  seemed  a  slow- 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    153 

moving  wall  of  gray  shadow  advancing  down  the  long  val- 
ley.   The  caribou  herds  were  almost  to  the  pass. 

The  work  was  not  yet  quite  done.  A  herd  of  a  thou- 
sand caribou  is  not  easy  to  turn  from  its  trail  by  a  single 
boy  with  an  ox.  They  came  up  silently,  a  slow-moving 
army  as  silent  as  the  wind. 

But  Nenook  knew  his  ground.  He  had  been  here  be- 
fore, only  of  course  on  previous  occasions  he  had  come  the 
long  way  of  the  river.  The  caribou,  to  follow  the  river 
down  to  the  sea,  were  obliged  to  traverse  a  narrow  pass 
scarcely  sixty  feet  wide.  If  turned  aside,  the  only  way 
they  could  go  was  to  skirt  the  edges  of  the  mountains  into 
another  valley — a  trail  that  would  ultimately  take  them 
nearly  one  hundred  miles  from  the  waiting  Red  People  beside 
the  Lower  River. 

Nenook  had  planned  every  step  of  his  campaign.  He 
leaped  down  from  his  mount  and  swiftly  went  to  work  to 
make  a  fire.  In  the  pocket  of  his  sealskin  jacket  he  had  a 
little  reindeer  moss,  dry  as  tinder,  a  flint,  and  a  broken 
piece  of  a  knife  blade  that  had  passed  through  a  dozen 
hands  to  him  from  a  trading  post  far  to  the  south.  A  little 
driftwood  was  strewn  along  the  river,  and  he  gathered  all 
he  could  find. 

Working  with  sure,  swift  hands  he  collected  armfuls 
of  dry  lichens,  and  with  these  he  started  a  dozen  other  fires. 
And  he  built  them  all  squarely  across  the  narrow  pass  be- 
tween the  river  and  the  cliff.  The  reindeer  had  paused  by 
now;  and  Nenook  knew  that  his  only  hope  of  sweeping 
them  about  the  shoulder  of  the  mountain  and  into  the  next 
valley  was  to  encircle  them  before  his  fires  burned  out. 
They  would  never  try  to  break  through  the  wall  of  fire  so 


154     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

long  as  an  open  road  lay  to  the  left  or  right.  And  only- 
one  thing  more  remained  to  do. 

The  principal  fuel  that  the  Innuits  use  is  seal  blubber. 
It  burns  with  remarkable  fierceness  and  heat,  either  in  lamps 
or  in  an  open  fire.  The  lichens  that  made  a  flaming  wall 
across  the  pass  would  burn  out  in  a  very  few  minutes.  So 
just  as  he  had  planned  to  do,  he  took  his  thirty-pound  lump 
of  seal  blubber  from  his  shoulder  bag  and  swiftly  cut  it 
into  a  dozen  lumps  of  about  three  pounds  each. 

He  flung  one  upon  each  of  the  fires;  and  once  more 
he  sprang  upon  the  back  of  his  mount.  "Just  a  little  way 
more,"  he  cried.  "Be  brave,  my  Kayak!  Just  a  little  way 
more,  and  the  thing  is  done." 

The  beast  was  fatigued  beyond  words  to  tell;  but  he 
responded  bravely  to  the  voice.  They  made  a  wide  circle 
and  got  in  the  rear  of  the  herds. 

Then  raising  his  voice  in  a  wild  shout,  Nenook  charged 
down  upon  them.  He  waved  his  coat  in  the  air.  He 
was  man,  and  these  caribou  knew  enough  of  men  to  fear 
them  worse  than  any  living  thing.  They  broke  into  a 
stampede. 

But  they  dared  not  try  to  cross  the  wall  of  fire.  They 
hesitated,  milled  for  an  instant  like  logs  in  a  stream,  then 
poured  about  the  shoulders  of  the  pass  to  the  valley  to 
the  right.  And  the  caribou  herds,  once  stampeded,  never 
retrace  their  steps. 

Two  hours  later  the  boy  and  the  musk-ox  were  still  rest- 
ing beside  the  river.  Kayak  stood  with  lowered  head;  and 
the  slender  Innuit  lad,  who  was  more  nearly  a  creature 
of  the  wild,  sat  just  at  his  feet.  Far  away  they  watched 
the  dim  gray  shadow  that  they  knew  was  the  caribou  herds 
plodding  steadily  down  a  strange  and  alien  valley.     They 


The  Son  of  the  Wild  Things    155 

would  never  come  back  now;  and  the  Red  People  beside 
the  Lower  River  would  wait  for  them  in  vain. 

All  at  once  Nenook  got  on  his  feet,  shivering  with  his 
hate.  "It  was  two  against  a  thousand — and  we  turned 
them,"  he  exulted.  "It  was  one  Innuit  against  one  hun- 
dred Red  People — and  I  have  had  vengeance  on  them.  My 
people  would  not  go  with  me,  so  I  struck  alone.  The  red 
murderers  will  wait  in  vain  beside  the  river  for  their  win- 
ter store  of  meat.  And  it  won't  come!  Because  of  us, 
Kayak,  it  won't  come. 

"Many  will  die  before  the  winter  is  out.  They  will 
have  to  change  their  hunting  grounds,  and  where  can  they 
go?  They  will  know  the  snow,  and  the  starving  time,  and 
the  ice  will  come  before  they  can  gather  any  other  winter 
food.    Brave  one,  the  debt  is  paid !" 

He  grew  quiet,  and  his  dark  eyes  scanned  the  waste  of 
Barren  Lands  about  them.  He  put  his  brown  arm  about 
Kayak's  neck. 

"We  will  be  wild  things,  you  and  I — from  henceforth," 
he  said.  "Perhaps  we  will  return  in  the  winter  months, 
but  from  henceforth  you  and  I  will  hunt  alone.  Yesterday 
I  was  a  boy,  and  last  night  I  was  a  man,  and  to-night  I  am 
neither  one — but  a  creature  of  the  wild  instead.  The  people 
would  not  come  with  me  and  fight  my  battle;  so  I  will 
not  go  to  them  again.  We  will  live  in  the  wild,  you  and 
I,  just  as  it  was  spoken  that  I  should  do.  I  have  come  into 
my  heritage  at  last." 


FURS 

The  Aikens'  tent  faced  east  and  a  little  north,  and  there 
was  always  a  time  in  late  afternoon  when  the  sunlight  flooded 
through  the  opening  in  the  rear.  It  looked  as  if  it  aimed 
straight  for  their  camp — coursing  down  through  a  rift  in  the 
tall  pines  beyond  the  river,  slanting  down  across  the  foam- 
ing waters,  and  full  upon  the  tent — and  sometimes  upon 
the  Aiken  brothers,  returned  from  their  work  on  river 
bank  and  hill.  Except  for  this  yellow  flood,  it  might  have 
been  very  hard  to  get  a  clear  view  of  their  faces  as  they 
played  their  game  one  day,  sitting  at  a  rude  table  just  out- 
side their  canvas  shelter. 

For  it  is  true  that  ordinarily  the  Aiken  camp  was  not 
well  lighted.  In  the  first  place  it  had  been  built  in  the 
shadow  of  the  pines, — those  tall,  dark,  forbidding  pines  of 
the  Oregon  wilderness.  And  the  pine  shadow  never  seems 
just  an  absence  of  light:  it  is  like  a  dusky  substance  in  itself 
that  the  eyes  strain  to  see  through,  and  which  can  get  into 
a  man's  soul,  after  a  certain  number  of  years,  and  turn  his 
thoughts  dark.  It  is  the  background  on  which  the  Oregon 
wilderness — far  and  far  in  the  Cascades — is  laid.  Be- 
sides, the  site  was  the  very  bottom  of  a  gloomy  and  steep- 
walled  glen  that  never,  even  in  the  springtime,  seemed  to 
give  itself  to  the  sun  with  that  sweet  surrender  that  is 
seen  by  country  dwellers  in  the  plowed  fields.  It  always 
seemed  dark,  and  the  sunlight  always  an  intruder,  flicker- 
ing nervously  in  the  spaces  between  the  trees  and  about  to 


Furs  157 

flit  away.  Even  the  white  foam  of  the  river,  the  brink  of 
which  was  just  behind  the  tent,  could  not  alleviate  the  effect 
of  gloom  about  the  camp.  Lastly,  one  of  the  Aiken  boys 
— the  older  and  the  stronger — was  the  kind  of  man  that 
never  seems  to  emerge  fully  into  the  light.  It  was  as  if  a 
shadow — an  essence  from  the  brooding  dusk  of  his  own 
thoughts — was  ever  over  him. 

But  the  moment's  burst  of  sunlight  illumined  his  face 
quite  clearly;  and  now  and  then,  as  his  arms  moved  in  the 
game,  it  revealed  his  lean,  dark  hand.  His  was  the  face  of 
a  hill  man,  and  at  first  one  would  have  been  mystified  by 
the  eyes.  They  were  dark  eyes,  in  which  a  man's  strong 
passions  smoldered  and  glowed ;  and  perhaps  they  had  some- 
thing to  do  with  the  nickname  by  which  he  was  known 
through  the  Divide.  Wolf  Aiken  was  what  the  people  called 
him.  The  name  was  all  over  him — in  the  fierce  eyes  that 
could  also  be  cunning,  the  stealth  of  his  motions,  the  sav- 
agery that  was  about  his  lips,  and  most  of  all,  in  the  lightning 
strength  of  his  muscles.  They  were  not  the  kind  of  muscles 
that  gather  in  great  bunches  and  stand  out  like  deformities. 
Rather,  his  legs  and  arms  and  back  looked  lean.  The  wil- 
derness, whose  child  he  was,  had  put  its  mark  upon  him. 

This  is  a  thing  the  wilderness  is  always  doing.  Sometimes 
the  mark  is  just  a  glitter  in  the  eyes,  as  if  the  pupils  had 
been  polished  to  steel  points,  and  it  goes  with  a  peculiar, 
listening  alertness  that  once  acquired  is  never  lost.  Both 
things  seem  to  be  mostly  habit, — the  result  of  the  con- 
stant watchfulness  that  is  soon  acquired  by  all  the  dwellers 
of  the  wild  places.  The  men  who  do  not  acquire  them  are 
merely  transients,  going  out  by  such  swift  and  certain  high- 
ways as  an  unguarded  step  on  a  precipice,  or  failure  to  find 
shelter  before  a  blizzard,  or  an  attempt  to  swim  the  river  at 


158     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

the  rapids.  These  are  all  one-way  roads,  as  the  signposts 
say,  and  the  transients  do  not  come  again  to  commit  more 
blunders. 

Wolf  Aiken  was  a  young  man,  scarcely  thirty;  but  the 
wilderness  had  already  destroyed  the  outer  marks  of  youth. 
The  skin  looked  very  dark,  the  hair  black  and  unkempt. 
The  lines  of  his  face  were  already  graven  deep.  He  was 
always  alert,  always  swift  and  deadly  of  muscle  and  the 
eyes  of  the  buzzard  in  the  sky  were  not  more  watchful 
than  his.  Usually,  in  his  work  on  the  river  bank,  Wolf 
was  as  cold  as  steel,  but  as  the  sun  revealed  him  this  April 
afternoon,  a  curious  heat  and  excitement  had  seemed  to  en- 
gross him.  He  tried  to  suppress  it,  setting  his  muscles  like 
iron  every  time  he  played  a  card ;  yet  the  gaunt  hand  trembled 
ever  so  slightly;  and  a  tiny  glow,  so  faint  that  the  eyes 
could  not  be  sure  of  it  at  all,  lay  on  the  dark  skin  of  his 
cheek  bones. 

Perhaps  Buck  Aiken,  his  brother,  did  not  notice  it.  Pos- 
sibly he  was  also  too  engrossed  in  the  game.  But  Wolf 
wondered  at  it  himself.  He  had  gambled  before,  always 
coldly,  always  with  a  face  inscrutable  as  a  mask,  and  no 
fire  or  passion  had  ever  led  him  to  a  false  play.  The  stakes 
had  been  large,  too;  and  here — he  tried  to  tell  himself  that 
the  stakes  were  not  worth  the  effort  of  the  game.  His 
eyes  wandered  over  toward  them — the  glossy,  dusky  heap  by 
the  tent  and  it  seemed  to  him  that  the  heart  within  him  beat 
faster. 

It  was  merely  a  little  arrangement  for  the  division  of  the 
season's  catch.  They  were  trappers,  the  Aikens,  and  they 
had  just  concluded  the  most  successful  season  of  their  lives. 
Furs  were  high;  yet  the  mink  and  marten  had  been  more 
plentiful  than  at  any  time  they  could  remember.    The  little 


Furs  159 

dark  heap  of  prime  pelts  represented  better  than  sixteen  hun- 
dred dollars^-a  good  sum  in  the  hills.  And  this  afternoon 
they  were  dividing  the  pelts  between  them. 

As  all  furriers  know,  there  is  often  a  great  difference  be- 
tween two  pelts  of  the  same  species.  Small  blemishes,  length 
of  hair,  color  and  size,  all  have  their  weight.  So  Buck  Aiken, 
the  younger  brother,  had  suggested  a  simple  way  to  secure 
a  fair  division.  He  laid  out  two  pelts  at  a  time,  the  same  fur 
and  as  near  the  same  value  as  he  could  determine.  Then  each 
man  drew  cards  from  their  soiled  deck  and  the  low  card 
got  first  choice  of  the  two  pelts. 

The  results  of  the  game  could  not  possibly  make  more  than 
a  few  dollars'  difference ;  and  Wolf  could  not  understand  his 
growing  rancor  at  his  brother's  consistent  winning.  Through- 
out the  division  only  twice  had  Wolf  drawn  the  lowest  card, 
and  in  each  case  the  two  pelts  had  been  so  nearly  alike 
that  he  could  hardly  make  a  choice.  But  many  times,  it 
seemed,  when  Buck  had  won,  he  had  noticed  a  pronounced 
difference  in  the  value  of  the  pelts.  It  had  begun  to  get 
on  his  nerves. 

It  seemed  to  him,  as  they  came  up  for  drawing,  that  he 
had  certain  mental  associations  with  every  individual  skin. 
It  was  not  that  he  had  known  the  living  creatures  that  wore 
them.  The  Little  People  of  forest  and  stream  are  dear  to  all 
real  lovers  of  nature;  but  Wolf's  only  relation  with  them 
was  one  of  death.  He  had  no  mental  picture  of  the  living 
mink — the  white-toothed  little  slayer  that  followed  moonlit 
trails  on  the  river  bank — but  he  did  have  particularly  vivid 
images  of  each  animal's  death. 

Buck  was  shuffling  now — the  last  pair  of  marten  skins 
were  up  for  the  draw — and  Wolf  leaned  forward  with  half- 
closed  eyes,  carried  back  to  certain  little  dramas  on  the  river 


160     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

bank  and  upon  the  snow-swept  hills.  He  remembered  so  well 
each  close-range  shot  with  the  killer-gun  or  blow  with 
wooden  mallet — so  close  to  the  sparkling  eyes — whenever 
their  victims  had  been  found  alive  in  their  traps.  When 
the  two  brothers  made  the  trap  line  together,  it  had  always 
been  Wolf  who  dispatched  them.  Buck  never  liked  to  do  it. 
Ever  since  a  child,  he  had  retained  a  peculiar  squeamishness 
about  such  things  that — although  rightfully  ridiculous — had 
always  seemed  lovable  to  Wolf.  Always  Wolf  had  been 
ready  enough  to  do  this  task  for  him;  and  now  he  remem- 
bered these  killings,  vivid  in  every  little  detail.  And  the 
strangeness  lay  not  only  in  the  fact  that  Wolf  remembered 
every  blow  he  had  dealt,  but  that  he  remembered  them — and 
every  detail  of  the  little  tragedies  in  which  they  were  con- 
cerned— with  a  kind  of  passion  and  ecstasy.  It  was  the  wolf 
for  which  he  was  named,  drunk  with  rapture  over  its  fallen 
prey ;  and  each  pelt  began  to  partake  of  a  new  and  astound- 
ing valuation  in  his  eyes. 

Again  his  gaunt  hand  drew  a  card,  then  flung  it  with 
a  curse  beside  the  card  his  brother  had  drawn.  Buck  had 
won  again.  He  began  to  look  over  the  two  marten  skins. 
Wolf  remembered  one  of  them  particularly  well.  The  little 
creature  had  been  found  alive  in  the  trap,  and  Wolf  could 
almost  hear  again  the  slight  tap  he  had  given  it  with  the 
mallet.  An  inexplicable  thrill  of  delight  went  through  him 
when  he  saw  that  it  was  the  inferior  of  the  two  skins.  Buck, 
of  course,  would  choose  the  other. 

"You  fool!"  his  voice  suddenly  rasped  out.  "The  other 
was  the  best  skin!"  For  Buck,  through  some  lapse  of  judg- 
ment, had  not  chosen  the  one  Wolf  had  anticipated. 

Buck  looked  up  with  a  question  in  his  dark  eyes.  For 
once  he  did  not  understand  his  brother.    Wolf  was  evidently 


Furs  161 

sincere,  and  it  was  a  queer  thing  that  he  should  seem  dis- 
tressed, rather  than  pleased,  at  his  brother's  error.  He 
chuckled  a  little. 

"Ill  keep  it,  anyway.  You've  been  getting  an  edge  the 
worst  of  it.    And  now  what  about  the  fisher?" 

Only  one  hide  was  left ;  and  Wolf's  mind  flew  to  it  with  a 
startling  and  overwhelming  passion.  It  was  a  glossy,  beau- 
tiful thing,  the  only  fisher  in  their  catch,  and  the  most  valu- 
able pelt  in  the  collection.  For  a  moment  the  immediate  sur- 
roundings faded  from  Wolf's  consciousness,  blinked  out  like 
a  light,  and  left  a  river-picture  that  filled  him  with  a  strange, 
quivering  eagerness.  It  was  down  by  the  great  whirlpool, 
beyond  the  fallen  pine,  where  the  waters  had  undermined  the 
bank.  Buck  had  not  been  with  him  when  he  found  the 
fisher,  alive  and  ready  to  fight  to  the  death  in  the  trap. 
There  had  been  many  blows  that  day.  Life  had  been 
tenacious  in  the  beautiful  body.  But  he  had  done  his  work 
well,  and  had  not  injured  the  skin.  And  Wolf  remembered 
that  afterward  there  had  been  a  little  flow  of  blood  from 
the  animal's  mouth ;  he  had  seen  it  on  his  hand. 

He  had  hardly  noticed  it  then.  The  memory  of  it  was 
clearer  than  the  fact  itself.  His  eyes  leaped  over  the  furry 
pelt,  reveling  in  it;  and  desire  was  upon  him.  Buck  seemed 
to  be  speaking  from  far  away. 

"Why  not  draw  for  it — fair  way  as  any,"  the  man  was 
saying.    "It's  a  prime  pelt." 

"Yes,  shuffle  'em  quick,"  Wolf  responded.  "Low  card 
wins,  the  same  as  before." 

Once  more  Buck  looked  up,  questioning.  Wolf  was  speak- 
ing in  an  unfamiliar  voice,  as  if  his  attention  were  riveted 
elsewhere.  Buck  followed  down  the  line  of  his  hungry  eyes 
until  they  rested  upon  the  pelt. 


162     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

"What  you  lookin'  at?"  he  demanded. 

Wolf  seemed  to  recoil.  "NothinV  He  reached  out  his 
lean  hand,  with  suddenly  narrowing  eyes.  "Let  me  deal, 
this  time,"  he  demanded. 

Buck  smiled  at  him.  "Sure."  He  passed  over  the  sticky 
deck,  and  the  cards  worked  through  Wolf's  fingers.  It 
seemed  to  his  glowing  eyes  that  the  last  card  to  leave  his 
fingers  on  one  side  was  a  three-spot,  coming  up  as  the  card 
nearest  the  top.  He  wasn't  sure — but  his  heart  leaped  at  the 
possibility. 

He  held  the  deck  out  in  his  soiled  hand.  "Cut?"  he 
asked  breathlessly. 

"Let  'em  ride!"    Buck  answered  with  a  smile. 

Without  waiting  for  Buck  to  draw  first,  Wolf  broke  the 
pack,  lifting  two  cards  from  the  deck.  It  was  a  chance,  any- 
way; and  the  dark  face  was  alive  with  delight  and  passion 
when  he  looked.     He  had  drawn  a  three. 

"Good  Lord,  what  luck!"  Buck  gasped.  There  was  no 
hint  of  suspicion  in  his  face.    "But  I'll  never  say  die — " 

He  cut  carelessly  from  the  deck.  Then  he  shouted  with 
boyish  joy. 

He  had  drawn  the  deuce;  and  he  threw  the  fisher  pelt 
upon  his  pile.  But  Wolf  had  no  answering  shout  of  blas- 
phemy. His  emotion  went  too  deep  for  that,  and  he  only 
stared  with  red  eyes  at  the  river,  intrigued  by  the  fury  and 
tumult  with  which  the  wild  stream  swept  by  their  camp. 

The  night  fell  crisp  and  chill, — the  kind  of  night  that 
usually  made  the  Aiken  brothers  think  at  once  of  the  comfort 
of  their  blankets.  The  wind  was  an  icy  breath  off  the  snow- 
fields,  whispering  strangely  in  the  trees  and  blowing,  like 
lips,  at  the  fire.  Yet  neither  of  the  brothers  went  at  once 
to  his  bed. 


Furs  163 

Buck  Aiken  lighted  his  pipe  and  supposed  of  course  that 
his  brother  was  joining  him  in  this  little  ritual  of  friendship. 
It  was  true  that  Wolf  held  his  pipe  between  his  teeth,  and 
in  the  growing  shadows  and  the  smoke  from  the  dying 
fire,  Buck  failed  to  observe  that  it  was  not  lighted.  It  was 
wholly  possible  that  Wolf  himself  was  not  aware  of  the  fact. 

He  wondered  why  his  brother  did  not  turn  in.  Usually 
the  boy,  loving  sleep,  went  quickly  to  his  bunk.  Often  when 
Wolf  wished  to  sit  and  enjoy  his  pipe  before  a  high  fire,  he 
was  scarcely  able  to  keep  the  younger  man  awake.  But  to- 
night Buck  still  lingered,  and  Wolf  felt  a  growing  im- 
patience.    He  wished  that  his  brother  would  go. 

He  didn't  know  why.  The  impulse  went  too  deep  for  him 
to  see.  He  wanted  to  be  alone  with  his  thoughts,  wanted 
this  with  a  curious,  passionate  eagerness.  Again  and  again  he 
looked  at  his  watch,  pretending  to  yawn  sleepily  himself. 
There  was  no  conscious  cunning  behind  the  little  actions. 
They  all  seemed  to  spring  from  some  dark  part  of  him,  an 
evil  genius  that  was  in  the  ascendency.  "If  you're  goin'  to 
set  up,  we'd  better  build  up  the  fire,"  Buck  said  suddenly. 

Wolf  was  cold  himself,  but  he  shook  his  head.  "We'll  be 
turnin'  in  in  a  minute.    Go  ahead  and  get  the  bunk  warm." 

All  men  who  have  been  in  the  wilderness  have  learned 
the  solace  and  comfort  of  a  high,  bright  fire  at  night.  As 
the  flames  leap,  the  memory  cords  of  a  thousand-thousand 
years  begin  to  hum,  and  a  man  crawls  out  of  his  civilization 
as  a  butterfly  from  its  chrysalis;  and  the  fire  suddenly  be- 
comes a  haven  and  protection  from  all  the  age-old  terrors  of 
the  darkness.  The  fire  was  man's  first  friend,  and  even  when 
the  darkness  no  longer  holds  things  to  fear,  when  the  eyes 
of  the  last  beast  of  prey  no  longer  blink  and  glow  in  the 
shadows,  the  memory  of  its  cheer  remains.     It  is  hard  for  a 


164    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

man  to  break  away  from.  Wolf  had  lied  when  he  said  he 
would  soon  turn  in.  He  simply  knew  that  Buck  would  not 
go  to  bed  as  long  as  the  fire  was  bright,  and  he  would  rather 
sit  cold  than  have  him  remain.  Besides,  the  coldness  was 
only  at  his  finger  tips  and  skin  and  feet,  not  in  his  heart 
or  his  brain.     It  was  as  if  he  had  a  fire  within  himself. 

He  had  no  definite  plans  to  carry  out  after  his  brother 
was  asleep.  He  only  knew  that  he  wanted  to  be  alone,  and 
he  had  some  vague  idea  of  examining  again  the  two  piles  of 
pelts.  He  wanted  to  count  them  over,  to  feel  the  soft  fur, 
and  perhaps — in  his  brother's  unconsciousness — he  would  be 
able  to  imagine  a  sense  of  possession  not  only  for  his  own 
portion  but  his  brother's  as  well.  A  sleeping  man  cannot 
own  furs,  he  thought.  They  would  be  his,  all  his, — for  the 
moment  at  least.  No  one  that  lies  still,  with  closed  eyes, 
could  ever  stretch  a  hand  to  the  treasure.  His  mind  seemed 
to  linger  over  the  thought  as  if  it  loved  it. 

He  glanced  furtively  at  Buck;  the  younger  man  was  busy 
at  some  cheery  plans  of  his  own.  His  thoughts  were  not  on 
the  furs,  unless  he  was  thinking  of  the  money  that  his  share 
of  them  would  bring.  There  would  be  gay  times  with  that 
wealth — eight  hundred  dollars  for  each  of  them.  His  eyes 
seemed  to  be  quite  bright,  not  dark  and  brooding  like  his 
brother's.  Wolf  scorned  him  in  his  thoughts,  yet  at  the 
same  time  he  envied  him.  For  did  he  not  own  half — the 
better  half — of  the  pelts?  At  least,  he  owned  them  now, — 
until  the  night's  sleep  claimed  him,  and  shut  his  bright,  boyish 
eyes. 

"Them  are  sure  fine  furs!"  Buck  suddenly  exulted. 

For  the  first  time  the  hot  light  went  out  of  Wolf's  eyes, 
and  left  them  icy  and  glittering.  If  Buck  had  seen  the  look, 
he  would  have  known  no  sleep  that  night.     Only  the  black 


Furs  165 

hatred  of  jealousy  and  covetousness  brings  that  look  to  the 
eyes  of  men.  But  Buck  rose  and  shuffled  to  his  cot;  and 
Wolf  was  left  alone  by  the  fire. 

He  waited  until  he  thought  the  younger  man  was  asleep. 
Then  he  piled  wood  on  the  fire.  In  its  bright  light  he  was 
able  to  make  a  close  scrutiny  of  the  deck  with  which  they 
had  played  that  afternoon.  He  hoped  that  he  would  find 
some  indication  of  cheating  on  his  brother's  part,  not  wholly 
understanding  why  he  hoped  so.  Yet  there  were  no  marks 
on  the  cards,  no  rough  edges  made  by  thumb  nails,  nothing 
to  which  he  could  attach  the  least  vestige  of  suspicion. 

He  got  up  then  and  stole  into  the  tent.  For  a  moment  he 
listened  to  Buck's  heavy  breathing.  The  man  was  asleep,  the 
dark  face  in  repose,  a  smile  about  the  lips.  They  could 
smile,  then,  those  lips,  even  in  sleep,  as  if  he  were  remember- 
ing his  possession  of  the  dark  heap  of  pelts  beside  the  cot. 

For  a  moment  it  seemed  to  Wolf  that  he  could  not  leave 
the  bedside.  He  stood  motionless,  trance-like,  scarcely 
breathing,  a  strange  cloud  and  murk  over  his  thoughts. 
Through  the  front  opening  of  the  tent  he  could  see  the  glow 
that  the  fire  made,  dimming  and  brightening  as  if  by  a  pulse. 
It  was  red,  too.  It  was  almost  as  red  as  the  blood  he  had 
shed  to  take  the  furs.  Blood  was  always  red  and  warm, — 
like  fire.  Beyond,  he  saw  the  stars  through  the  rifts  in  the 
trees. 

Buck  had  kicked  off  his  heavy  trousers  before  climbing 
in  between  the  blankets,  and  with  them  the  belt  on  which 
he  carried  his  hunting  knife.  The  trousers  lay  beside  the 
tree-bough  pallet,  and  Wolf  slowly  bent  toward  them.  As 
his  hands  moved  over  the  cloth,  with  a  curious  nervousness, 
his  knuckles  touched  the  handle  of  the  knife.  He  couldn't 
keep  them  from  it. 


166    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

The  steel  rib  of  the  knife-hilt  was  cold;  yet  a  flame 
climbed  up  Wolf's  arm  through  his  veins.  He  stood  erect 
again,  a  long  time,  listening  and  watching.  Again  he  bent 
and  drew  the  blade  half  out.  His  fingers  seemed  to  lock 
about  it.  He  touched  its  edge;  Buck  always  kept  his  knife 
sharp  as  a  razor.  Then  Wolf's  eyes  wandered  to  a  little 
exposed  patch  of  bare  flesh  just  under  the  curve  of  his 
brother's  jowl.  But  he  pushed  the  blade  back  into  its  case 
and  stepped  forth  to  the  door  of  the  tent. 

The  fire  was  almost  in  embers  again,  and  its  red  glow  went 
out  over  the  water.  Wolf  bent  and  lifted  both  heaps  of 
furs  into  his  arms. 

He  carried  them  out  and  laid  them  beside  the  fire.  They 
were  his,  all  his — until  Buck  wakened.  They  were  beautiful 
and  soft  and  glossy ;  they  would  bring  much  money  in  the  fur 
market.  He  began  to  wonder  if  any  amount  of  money 
would  be  great  enough  to  equal  their  value, — to  pay  for  their 
softness  and  luster,  and  to  make  up  for  the  blood  he  had 
spilled  to  get  them.  They  were  his  own,  all  his;  for  had 
he  not  always  administered  the  blow  that  had  killed  the 
wounded?  He  had  won  his  right  to  them  by  killing;  why- 
should  Buck  carry  away  half  of  them? 

The  trapper  ran  his  fingers  through  the  fur,  and  the  mo- 
tion yielded  a  curious  excitement.  Then  he  pressed  the  great 
lovely  fisher  skin  against  his  cheek. 

It  carried  him  back  to  the  day  and  the  place  of  the  catch — 
far  up  the  river,  where  the  wateTS  had  undermined  the 
bank.  There  was  a  whirlpool  there  in  which  no  living 
creature — except  the  Little  People  of  the  river  themselves — 
might  live.  It  was  a  cataract,  a  wild,  tumultuous  place, 
where  the  waters  roared  and  broke  against  great  rocks,  and 
even  the  salmon  were  dashed  back  and  forth  in  their  upward 


Furs  167 

climb  to  spawn.  He  remembered  now  that  black  whirlpool; 
and  very  slowly  and  carefully  he  recalled  every  occasion 
Buck  and  he  had  passed  that  way. 

He  remembered  that  only  on  his  last  visit,  when  he  had 
caught  the  fisher,  did  he  notice  that  the  supporting  earth  of 
the  bank  had  all  been  washed  away.  It  was  just  a  green 
shelf,  extending  out  over  the  whirlpool,  and  possibly  it  had 
already  fallen  in.  He  was  curiously  sickened  at  the  thought. 
But  if  it  hadn't,  the  slightest  weight  would  break  it  down. 

There  was  even  a  wilder  riffle  than  this,  just  back  of  the 
tent.  He  looked  a  long  time  into  the  wild  waters,  fascinated 
by  the  faint  glow  that  the  fire  flung  over  them.  They  would 
clutch  a  man,  those  waters;  they  would  hurl  him  against 
the  great  boulders  of  the  river  bed;  they  would  carry  him 
away  as  sleep  had  carried  Buck, — only  from  such  a  sleep 
he  could  never  awaken. 

Wolf's  creed  was  the  creed  of  the  beast  for  which  he 
was  named,  but  it  was  also  the  creed  of  the  river:  to  slay 
all  that  could  not  conquer  it.  Wolf  Aiken  rose  slowly  and 
went  to  the  pile  of  steel  traps  that  the  two  of  them  had 
but  recently  taken  up. 

He  moved  among  them  very  cautiously,  so  that  the  chains 
would  not  rattle.  He  did  not  permit  the  passion  that  was 
upon  him  to  affect  the  iron  control  that  his  nerves  had  over 
his  muscles.  Then  he  tiptoed  to  the  door  of  the  tent  for 
a  last  look  at  the  sleeper. 

Buck  always  slept  soundly,  never  wakening  until  the 
first  light  of  day.  Wolf  left  him  and  headed  up  the  river 
bank,  a  steel  trap  in  his  hand. 

It  was  a  long  walk  that  Wolf  made  that  night,  but  he 
was  tireless  as  the  river  beside  him.  It  was  as  if  the  laws 
in  obedience  to  which  the  river  flowed  to  the  sea  were  no 


168     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

more  commanding,  no  more  inexorable,  than  those  that  drove 
him  up  the  bank  that  night. 

He  reached  at  last  the  outstretching  bank  over  the  whirl- 
pool where  the  fisher  had  been  caught.  No,  it  had  not  yet 
fallen  in;  and  a  careless  eye,  unless  the  observer  climbed 
down  the  bank  to  the  water's  edge  below  or  above  the  place, 
would  never  see  that  its  supporting  earth  had  been  under- 
mined. 

Wolf  picked  up  a  long,  dry  piece  of  driftwood — a  slender 
dead  limb  of  a  pine,  and  looped  the  chain  of  the  trap  over  its 
end.  Then  he  crept  as  near  as  he  dared  to  the  overhanging 
bank,  and  carefully  lifted  the  trap  clear  to  its  edge. 

As  he  lay  there,  crouched  and  trembling,  the  old  buck  that 
fed  on  the  hillsides  might  have  mistaken  him  for  the  gray 
wolf  itself,  that  remorseless  slayer  for  which  he  was  named, 
crouched  in  ambush  on  the  deer  trail. 

Never  had  Wolf  cooked  the  breakfast  better.  His  hands 
were  steady  and  sure.  No  telltale  flush  was  on  his  face. 
And  he  waited  until  an  hour  after  breakfast  before  he  began 
the  morning's  business. 

He  sauntered  over  to  the  pile  of  traps  and  began  to  look 
them  over.  He  tested  the  springs  of  some;  he  jerked  the 
chains  of  others  in  his  hands.  Then  he  looked  up  ques- 
tioningly. 

"Buck,  where's  that  old  Number  215  that  caught  the 
fisher?" 

The  younger  Aiken  looked  up.  "It's  right  there.  Ain't 
gone  blind,  have  you,  Wolf?" 

One  little  line  about  the  older  man's  mouth  quivered — 
ever  so  slightly.  "Well,  it  ain't.  I  guess  I  left  it  up  the 
river." 

Buck  strolled  over.     "But  I  thought  I  saw  the  old  brute 


Furs  169 

just  yesterday."  He  kicked  the  pile  of  traps.  "But  it  aint 
here.     I  must  have  seen  another.     I  guess  you  left  it." 

For  a  moment  Wolf  seemed  to  be  trying  to  recollect.  "Of 
course !  You  know  the  big  pine  across  the  river — where  we 
caught  that  last  mink?" 

"Yes." 

"There's  a  green  bank  just  above.  Ain't  more  than  a  mile 
from  here.  It  must  be  lying  on  the  bank  where  I  dropped 
it,  when  I  stopped  to  loop  up  the  others.  There's  a  little 
brush  between  the  tree  and  the  spot,  but  you  can  circle 
the  brush  and  come  right  out  to  it.  If  you  ain't  got  nothin' 
better  to  do,  you  might  go  and  get  it — and  maybe  pick  off 
a  deer  on  the  way." 

Buck  started  to  get  up,  and  for  the  first  time  a  quiver 
passed  over  Wolf's  frame.  But  his  eyes  drifted  to  the  two 
piles  of  pelts,  and  at  once  he  was  steady.  Buck  headed  up 
the  river. 

He  turned  just  once  when  the  brush  had  obscured  his 
body.  Only  the  face  suddenly  showed  through  the  thickets, 
and  it  seemed  to  Wolf's  eyes  that  it  gleamed  quite  white.  It 
was  only  an  effect  of  the  sunlight — rare  indeed  in  this  somber 
glen — but  for  an  instant  the  face  seemed  to  have  the  pallor 
of  death.  Wolf  stood  still  a  long  time,  then  went  back  to 
the  piles  of  pelts. 

Wolf  gave  him  thirty  minutes  to  walk  to  the  river,  and 
thirty  more,  in  case  of  a  failure  of  plans,  to  return.  The  long 
morning  passed,  and  at  noon  Wolf  cooked  himself  his  usual 
midday  meal.  It  was  not  that  he  felt  hungry.  But  the  cun- 
ning of  the  damned  was  already  upon  him:  in  case  some- 
thing did  go  wrong  with  his  plans,  and  Buck  returned, 
it  would  seem  more  natural  to  be  cooking  over  the  camp  fire. 
It  might  be  that  the  younger  man  had  misunderstood  the 


170    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

direction  and  was  spending  the  morning  in  fruitless  search. 
It  would  not  do  to  arouse  his  suspicions  now ;  otherwise  Buck 
would  be  careful  not  to  give  him  another  opportunity. 

The  afternoon  was  long  and  still,  with  hardly  a  breath  of 
air  in  the  pine  tops.  As  the  hours  passed.  Wolf's  exultation 
increased.  Again  and  again  his  hands  worked  through  the 
piles  of  pelts,  gloating  over  them,  drunk  with  the  knowledge 
of  possession.  They  were  his,  all  his — for  Buck  had  not 
returned. 

Twilight  is  always  a  mystery  in  the  mountains,  and  just 
at  the  drop  of  it,  Wolf  started  up  the  river.  It  was  well  to 
pretend  to  make  a  search,  he  thought :  he  would  be  able  to  tell 
the  curious  in  the  valley  below  how  he  had  hunted  over  all 
the  hills,  and  be  able  to  prove  it  if  he  wished.  He  hastened 
through  the  heavy  brush. 

At  the  edge  of  the  fallen  pine,  he  drew  up  with  a  sudden 
jerk.  He  knew  here  his  first  moment  of  terror.  What  if 
Buck  had  discovered  the  deadfall  in  time  and  was  waiting 
with  ready  rifle  for  Wolf  to  come?  It  would  be  exactly 
what  Buck  would  do:  for  justice,  in  the  mountains,  is  a 
thing  to  deal  swiftly.  Buck  would  know  that  Wolf  would 
come  to  view  his  work,  ostentatiously  to  make  a  search. 
His  sight  would  be  true  and  keen  along  the  rifle  barrel. 

Wolf  waited  a  long  time,  while  the  shadows  grew  and 
deepened  around  him.  Already  it  was  almost  too  dark  to  see. 
Then  he  crept  on. 

He  made  a  great  circle,  coming  out  on  the  other  side 
of  the  deadfall.  And  in  a  moment  more  he  was  at  the  brink 
of  the  river. 

The  whole  contour  of  the  bank  seemed  changed.  The  trap 
was  no  longer  in  sight;  the  long  stick  that  he  had  used 
slanted  down  from  the  bank,  and  the  end  of  it,  resting  in 


Furs  171 

the  water,  vibrated  like  a  living  thing.  It  startled  him  for  a 
moment.  It  was  as  if  a  finger  were  pointing  out  of  the 
whirlpool. 

Fully  six  feet  of  earth  had  crumbled  away.  The  trap, 
of  course,  had  fallen  with  the  man  who  had  stepped  upon  the 
treacherous  place  to  get  it.  Wolf  cursed,  a  savage  sound  in 
the  gathering  darkness. 

He  walked  rather  swiftly  on  the  way  back  to  his  camp. 
He  wanted  to  be  with  his  furs  again, — to  realize  that  they 
were  all,  all  his,  with  none  now  to  claim  even  a  part  of  them. 
He  had  killed  the  creatures  that  wore  them ;  who  else  had  a 
right  to  them?  Besides,  the  deepening  darkness  and  silence 
of  the  forest  oppressed  him. 

He  had  a  strange  fancy  that  the  river,  by  whose  side  he 
walked,  was  racing  with  him.  It  was  as  if  it  were  carrying 
something  that  it  wished  to  bring  to  the  camp  before  he 
himself  arrived  there.  It  was  so  white  in  the  darkness;  its 
song  was  so  prolonged  and  strange;  it  was  so  wild  and  in- 
domitable. And  for  the  first  time  Wolf  began  to  wonder 
how  soon  his  brother's  body  would  be  found. 

He  had  not  considered  this  phase  of  the  issue  before. 
Perhaps  even  now  it  was  caught  in  one  of  the  dim  under- 
passages  beneath  the  fallen  logs,  from  which  it  would  never 
emerge.  Possibly  it  would  continue  down  the  river's  wild 
course  clear  to  the  settlements  in  the  valleys.  It  would  be 
only  a  mystery  there:  no  human  mind  could  conceive  of 
the  sequence  of  events  that  had  led  to  the  tragedy. 

He  reached  the  camp  and  at  once  built  a  roaring  fire. 
He  told  himself  it  was  a  signal  fire,  to  guide  his  lost  brother 
into  camp.  He  would  be  able  to  tell,  in  the  settlements, 
that  he  had  taken  every  precaution  to  find  his  lost  brother. 
He  did  not  know  there  was  any  other  reason.     He  wouldn't 


172     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

have  admitted  any  other.  But  the  same  deep-buried  instinct 
that  is  the  basis  for  the  love  that  all  men  have  for  the  open 
fire  had  its  effect  here:  it  was  a  haven  from  such  dangers 
as  might  be  waiting  in  the  darkness.  He  wanted  its  com- 
pany to-night. 

For  three  nights  Wolf  Aiken  built  high  fires  on  the 
river  bank.  During  the  days  between,  he  made  excursions 
into  the  forest,  always  with  the  intention  of  traveling  wide 
and  far,  but  always  returning  soon.  Somehow,  the  forest  got 
on  his  nerves  as  it  never  had  before.  It  seemed  to  him 
that  there  were  vast  forces  moving  in  it  that  he  could  not  see. 
There  was  a  great  purpose  and  theme  in  its  silence,  its 
ineffable  aloofness,  but  it  was  always  obscured  in  a  patch  of 
distant  shadow.    Besides,  he  wanted  to  be  with  his  furs. 

Not  that  he  handled  them  much,  after  the  first  day.  The 
sense  of  possession  was  enough.  He  arranged  them  in  one 
heap  and  tied  them  into  a  glossy,  beautiful  bundle.  With  a 
thong  of  buckskin  he  tied  the  bundle  to  the  ridgepole,  at  the 
very  rear  of  the  tent  and  almost  at  the  brink  of  the  river. 
But  every  day  the  thought  of  their  possession  was  deareT  to 
him.  Soon  he  could  leave  the  dreadful  forest  and  take  them 
with  him  down  into  the  valleys.  Men  would  admire  them 
there,  and  many  would  try  to  buy  them.  He  wondered 
if  any  of  these  admiring  men  would  try  to  kill  him  for  them. 

But  his  self-control  was  not  so  perfect  that  he  could  shut 
out  certain  haunting  memories.  And  all  at  once  Wolf  re- 
membered that  his  brother  had  been  a  particularly  able 
swimmer. 

The  thought  startled  him  a  little.  What  if  Buck  had 
been  able  to  brave  the  current,  to  swim  out  of  that  terrible 
whirlpool,  and  would  sometime  return  to  pay  his  debts? 
What  if  Buck  should  be  waiting  now,  in  the  thickets  across 


Furs  173 

the  river,  for  the  moment  in  which  he  might  make  amends. 
He  cursed  himself  for  not  killing  Buck  that  first  night  while 
he  slept. 

He  began  to  wish  that  he  could  find  the  body,  and  the 
wish  grew  until  it  was  the  greatest  desire  of  his  life.  Bodies 
usually  rose  after  a  few  hours,  he  knew.  Wolf  began  to 
keep  constant  watch  of  the  river  for  a  figure  that  might 
come  floating  by.  He  was  almost  afraid  to  go  to  sleep  at 
night  for  fear  that  it  would  pass  when  he  did  not  see  it.  And 
that  would  mean  a  whole  life  of  tormenting  doubt,  a  whole 
life  of  waiting  for  Buck  to  return. 

Fortunately  he  was  able  to  watch  the  river  perfectly  when 
he  sat  up  in  his  bunk.  It  was  a  grim  and  eerie  watch !  Far 
into  the  night  he  would  sit,  wholly  motionless,  with  eyes 
straining  into  the  silvered  foam.  He  would  hear  its  eternal 
chant, — a  song  of  hunger  that  could  never  be  quite  satisfied. 
Ever  the  river  seemed  less  and  less  a  lifeless  phenomenon  of 
nature,  and  more  and  more  a  living  thing,  a  thing  that  ever 
hungered  and  was  never  full  fed.  He  couldn't  keep  up  with 
it.  He  couldn't  watch  it  all  the  time.  It  seemed  to  him 
that  it  was  cheating  him,  trying  to  get  ahead  of  him,  running 
ever  and  ever,  even  in  the  moment  or  two  he  slept. 

He  did  have  more  rational  moments.  In  these  he  was 
usually  able  to  convince  himself  that  Buck's  body  had  been 
caught  in  some  dim  passage  of  the  river  bed,  perhaps  wedged 
in  between  boulders  or  entrapped,  like  a  fishnet,  in  driftwood. 
Besides,  it  might  have  floated  far  past  his  camp  the  first  night, 
still  beneath  the  surface.  But  always  the  old  dread  and 
uncertainty  returned. 

Buck  had  been  an  able  swimmer:  Wolf  could  remember 
just  how  he  had  looked  when  he  struck  off  across  the  swim- 
ming hole  that  they  had  played  in  as  children.    His  body  had 


174     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

always  gleamed ;  and  Wolf  could  picture  the  same  gleaming 
body  fighting  through  the  torrents.  He  had  used  to  dive 
for  long,  breath-taking  seconds,  until  it  seemed  to  the  watch- 
ing boys  that  surely  some  disaster  had  happened  to  him 
in  the  ooze  of  the  bottom ;  but  always,  laughing,  he  had  risen 
again.  Wolf  could  still  see  his  streaming  hair  and  eyes  as 
he  came  out.    What  river  bottom  could  hold  him  now  ? 

In  a  moment  of  vivid  self-consciousness,  he  knew  what 
he  must  do.  One  more  night  would  he  lie  in  his  camp,  but 
only  one.  In  the  morning  he  would  go  down  to  the 
settlements  and  carry  his  precious  furs  with  him.  The  river 
could  be  forgotten  then.  The  silence  would  no  longer 
follow  him,  and  his  dreadful  watch  would  be  over.  After 
all,  it  was  just  his  dark  thoughts.  He  would  be  all  right 
once  he  got  out  of  the  wilderness. 

Wolf  Aiken  did  not  even  remove  his  heavy  logging  boots 
before  going  to  his  bunk.  He  wished  to  leave  quickly  in 
the  morning.  He  had  packed  his  few  belongings;  the  pelts 
still  swung  from  the  ridgepole  and  could  be  easily  strapped  on 
his  back.  The  prospect  of  deliverance  from  the  dark  woods 
gave  him  back,  in  a  measure,  his  self-control. 

He  would  not  watch  the  river  this  night,  he  thought. 
It  had  all  been  a  fancy,  anyway,  the  beginning  of  madness, 
and  nothing  that  floated  on  its  water  could  keep  him  awake 
to-night.    He  was  desperate  for  sleep. 

Yet  he  was  not  entirely  sure  of  himself:  there  had  been 
nights  before  when  he  had  resolved  to  sleep  but  had  lain 
awake  to  watch  instead.  To-night  he  reversed  his  usual 
position  in  the  bed,  lying  with  head  toward  the  rear  of  the 
tent  and  the  river,  rather  than  the  front.  To  see  the  stream 
at  all,  he  had  to  sit  up  and  turn  his  head  completely  about. 

The  wilderness  at  night  is  almost  always  still;  but  to- 


Furs  175 

night  the  hush  that  followed  was  so  deep  and  strange  that  it 
had  a  quality  of  unreality.  The  river  still  sang  under  it,  but 
did  not  in  the  least  affect  its  absolute  depth.  Wolf,  still  at 
the  fag-end  of  his  dream,  heard  his  own  blood  booming  in 
his  eardrums,  and  that  was  all. 

It  beat  ever  louder  and  faster,  until  it  seemed  to  deafen 
him.  There  was  a  strange  quality  in  the  darkness,  too, — a 
breath-taking,  groping  horror  that  seemed  to  paralyze  him  in 
his  blankets.  Some  danger  was  waiting  just  without  his 
tent,  even  now  crouching,  and  Wolf's  long  body  jerked  in  the 
blankets  as  he  started  out  of  his  sleep. 

He  opened  his  eyes,  blind  at  first  to  everything  except 
the  great  silvery  patches  that  lay  just  outside  the  tent  open- 
ing. He  did  not  know  what  they  were.  He  didn't  realize 
that  the  moon  had  come  up  while  he  dozed.  And  terror 
swept  through  him,  through  every  nerve  and  into  the  last 
fiber  of  every  muscle,  as  a  twig  cracked  just  outside  his  tent. 

The  sound  must  have  occurred  the  instant  that  he  opened 
his  eyes,  only  an  instant  after  the  gust  of  wind.  In  his  mind, 
it  was  just  at  the  river  bank.  He  didn't  know  that  he  had 
lost  his  sense  of  direction.  He  had  forgotten  that  he  had 
lain  down  in  his  bunk  in  the  opposite  direction  from  usual, 
and  the  rear  of  the  tent  was  to  him  the  front. 

It  is  always  hard  to  locate  the  exact  source  of  any  of 
the  little  night  sounds  in  the  mountains.  The  sound  might 
have  been  any  place  within  forty  feet  of  the  tent,  but  to  him 
it  sounded  as  if  it  were  immediately  behind  him,  in  what  was 
to  him  the  front  of  the  tent.  The  fact  that  the  river  sang 
there  instead  of  in  front  as  usual  did  not  clear  matters  up 
in  his  mind.  He  gave  no  thought  to  the  river,  except  in  the 
sense  of  what  might  rise  out  of  it.  He  was  listening  too 
intently  to  the  other  sounds. 


176    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

But  it  came  about  that  in  one  little  instant  more,  all  the 
sounds  that  the  wild  might  utter  could  no  longer  draw  his 
attention.  His  eyes  dropped  down,  just  for  an  instant,  and 
for  the  first  time  he  saw  a  long,  strange  shadow  on  the 
tent  floor.  He  gazed  at  it  with  growing  horror.  For  the 
shadow  wavered — in  all  that  world  of  silence  and  immobility, 
it  wavered  to  and  fro. 

There  was  only  one  thing  that  could  cast  a  shadow  like 
that.  Some  form  in  the  doorway,  straight  and  tall,  had  inter- 
cepted the  flood  of  moonlight  through  the  tent  opening. 
A  sound  is  only  a  vibration  in  the  air,  a  thing  in  which  any 
man  might  be  deceived,  but  this  was  reality.  He  seemed  to 
know  that  some  figure  had  come  and  was  standing  in  the 
front  opening  of  the  tent,  its  eyes  upon  him. 

"It's  Buck,  come  back,"  his  hoarse  whisper  spoke. 

Whether  Buck  had  returned — risen  like  the  swimmer  he 
was — out  of  the  cataract,  or  whether  he  had  never  fallen  into 
the  trap,  did  not  make  any  difference.  He  would  have  the 
same  debts  to  pay,  the  same  remorseless  punishment  to  in- 
flict. Whether  life  was  in  him  didn't  matter  in  the  least. 
He  had  come  to  get  his  furs.  With  a  wild,  half-strangled 
cry,  Wolf  leaped  to  his  feet. 

The  sharp  blade  caught  the  moonlight  and  glittered  in  his 
hand.  It  made  a  streak  of  light  as  Wolf  leaped  the  length 
of  the  tent.  There  was  a  great  dark  shape,  just  as  he  knew 
there  would  be,  between  him  and  the  moonlit  opening  of  the 
tent.  It  was  the  thing  that  had  cast  the  shadow,  and  Wolf 
did  not  take  time  to  notice  anything  except  its  outline.  He 
simply  beheld  it  as  he  lunged  from  the  bed,  and  in  blind 
terror  he  hurled  himself  against  it  with  descending  knife. 

It  gave  before  him,  swinging  out  beneath  his  body,  and 
wood  cracked  sharply  beneath  him.    Then  there  was  a  sense 


Furs  177 

of  vast  and  immeasurable  disaster,  a  great  falling  and  rock- 
ing and  hovering  at  the  edge  of  nothingness.  And  in  the 
little  fraction  of  a  second  before  the  end,  Wolf  knew  the 
truth. 

The  wilderness  vengeance  would  not  have  been  complete, 
if  he  had  not  known.  The  gust  of  wind,  when  it  had 
shaken  the  pine  tops,  had  also  swung  back  and  forth  the 
bundle  of  furs  that  hung  from  Wolf's  ridgepole.  Startled 
out  of  his  dream,  he  had  seen  the  wavering  of  the  shadow 
that  the  furs  cast  on  the  tent  floor;  he  had  seen  their  dark 
outline  as  he  leaped,  and  he  had  hurled  his  weight  against 
them. 

It  was  the  rear  of  the  tent — at  the  brink  of  the  river — not 
the  front,  as  he  had  thought.  His  arms  went  about  the 
bundle  of  furs,  but  they  could  not  check  the  force  of  his  leap. 
They  swung  out;  the  pressure  on  the  ridgepole  pulled  the 
tent  from  its  supporting  poles,  and  canvas  and  all  plunged 
with  him  into  the  river. 

There  was  no  swimming  in  that  current.  The  canvas 
clung  about  him,  swept  over  him  and  held  him  fast,  and  the 
arms  of  the  river  seized  him  with  resistless  power.  They 
hurled  him  here  and  there  like  a  straw. 

So  he  did  not  try.  The  moon  still  shone,  its  soft  light 
enchanting  the  wilderness ;  and  the  river — the  deathless  spirit 
of  the  wild  itself — sang  on. 

Here  and  there  the  little  water  people — the  mink  and  the 
great  trout — scurried  away  in  fright  as  a  dark  something 
was  swept  down  past  their  dim  haunts.  The  canvas  of  the 
tent  still  enveloped  his  body,  locking  fast  the  embrace  in 
which  Wolf  Aiken's  arms  encircled  his  bundle  of  furs. 


LITTLE  DEATH 

There  is  always  a  gentle  wind  that  blows  through  the 
Divide  just  at  the  fall  of  darkness.  It  comes  from  the  snow 
fields,  but  whither  it  goes  and  where  it  dies  no  govern 
ment  weather  men  have  ever  taken  the  trouble  to  determine. 
It  does  various  things  as  it  goes  along, — pausing  here  and 
there  to  wag  the  tops  of  the  pine  trees,  like  great  sema- 
phore signals  to  one  another,  brings  certain  smells  and  other 
messages  to  the  senses  of  the  wild  creatures,  and  plays  a 
curious  song  in  the  reeds  of  the  river's  edge.  On  this  par- 
ticular evening,  Amos  Hardman  felt  that  it  would  also  bring 
in  the  cold. 

But  the  man  did  not  particularly  care.  It  was  true  that 
as  yet  he  had  built  no  cabin  on  his  recently  acquired  farm 
on  the  Upper  Umpqua.  But  he  had  a  tent  on  the  very  shore 
of  the  river,  and  as  all  campers  know,  a  tent  can  be  made 
snug  and  warm  in  the  worst  of  weather.  There  were 
plenty  of  warm  blankets,  and  there  was  more  firewood 
on  the  hills  about  than  any  man  would  care  to  attempt 
to  measure  in  a  lifetime.  In  fact  there  were  hundreds 
of  miles  of  nothing  but  firewood.  For  one  of  the  greatest 
timber  belts  in  the  world  sweeps  on  either  side  of  the 
Umpqua  River  of  Oregon. 

He  would  have  no  cause  to  fear  the  chill  night  that  was 
sure  to  follow.  It  would  probably  be  the  first  frost  of  the 
fall.  Leaves  in  a  moment  struck  yellow  and  red,  falling 
acorns  and  the  first  glint  of  the  wings  of  the  waterfowl, — 


Little  Death  179 

this  was  what  frost  meant  to  the  high  plateaus.  It  meant 
even  more  personal  things  to  Amos  Hardman.  He  won- 
dered if  his  cattle  would  suffer  on  the  range,  and  if  his 
growing  things  would  be  killed.  He  busied  himself  about 
the  little  farmyard. 

The  chickens  were  going  to  roost,  and  methodically  Amos 
Hardman  counted  them.  There  had  been  a  full  dozen  when 
they  had  mounted  to  their  perches  the  previous  evening. 
Now  there  were  just  eleven.  He  called  into  the  growing 
shadows. 

Just  a  moment  he  stood  in  thought;  then  he  turned  one 
hundred  yards  up  the  river.  On  the  green  bank  he  found 
what  he  was  looking  for, — a  little  telltale  bunch  of  feathers 
and  curious  dark  spots  on  the  herbage.  The  angry  furrows 
grew  in  the  man's  face  as  he  bent  to  examine  them. 

With  the  care  of  a  detective  he  looked  at  the  tracks 
in  the  soft  dirt.  He  was  naturalist  enough  to  identify  them 
at  once.  "A  mink,"  he  said  to  himself.  "The  low-lived 
little  critter!" 

It  was  all  very  plain.  A  mink — one  of  those  bloodthirsty 
little  slayers  that  have  hunting  grounds  on  the  waterways 
— had  made  short  work  of  one  of  his  pullets.  It  was  the 
loss  of  a  few  cents,  and  it  was  even  a  greater  blow  to  his 
feelings.    Amos  shook  his  fist  at  the  river. 

"Hang  you,  I'll  get  you  for  that,  if  it  takes  all  winter," 
he  cried.  "You  little  bandit — you'll  die  for  it  yet.  What 
a  mink  was  ever  created  for  is  a  mystery  to  me,  anyway — 
the  most  worthless,  useless,  no-good  thief  in  the  world." 

He  turned  swiftly  back  to  his  tent  and  obtained  his 
shotgun;  then  looked  up  and  down  the  shore.  He  thought 
he  might  catch  sight  of  the  robber.  The  shadows  grew  and 
deepened;  and  soon  it  became  plain  that  even  Hardman's 


180    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

keen  eyes  could  no  longer  detect  a  mink's  body  in  the  reeds. 
He  turned  up  the  hill  for  a  final  effort,  in  a  field  that  lay 
nearly  a  mile  from  his  tent. 

"Most  worthless  critter  in  the  world,"  he  said  to  himself 
as  he  started  off  into  the  shadows.  "No  use  to  anything 
or  any  one  on  earth." 

But  although  Amos  Hardman  had  eyes  trained  to  the 
distances  of  the  hills,  there  were  many  things  indeed  that 
he  could  not  see.  He  had  lived  many  years  among  the 
wild  things  of  the  forest.  He  was  a  kindly  man,  as 
mountaineers  go,  and  not  swift  to  condemn.  Yet  there 
were  existences  in  the  forest  about  him,  the  motives  and 
missions  of  which  he  could  not  grasp.  Perhaps  even  Little 
Death,  the  Mink,  had  his  place  in  the  scheme  of  things. 

For  there  is  a  curious  balance  in  nature.  It  seems  to 
be  the  plan  of  nature  that  no  one  species  may  be  allowed 
to  overrun  the  earth.  The  ideal  seems  to  be  a  world  lit- 
erally teeming  with  all  forms  of  life,  and  that  means  that 
a  certain  number  of  foes  must  be  created  for  every  living 
form  to  keep  the  numbers  of  each  in  check.  The  stately 
cougar  and  the  larger  beasts  of  prey  are  too  proud  to  de- 
vote much  of  their  time  and  energies  to  the  rodents  and 
fowl  and  such  small  people,  and  nature  soon  saw  the  need 
of  a  new  breed  of  meat-eaters  to  take  care  of  them.  So 
she  evolved  a  whole  family  of  small-size,  wiry,  courageous 
hunters  and  identified  them  with  a  little  gland  of  astonish- 
ingly potent  musk  in  the  body  of  each. 

The  weasels,  the  ferrets,  the  fishers,  the  martens — even 
the  despised  mink — were  members  of  this  family.  If  Amos 
Hardman  had  thought  about  this  fact,  perhaps  he  wouldn't 
have  been  so  quick  to  condemn  its  existence  as  useless  and 
purposeless.     There  were  many  things  indeed  he  did  not 


Little  Death  181 

know  about  Little  Death;  otherwise  his  tone  might  have 
been  different.  He  didn't  know  of  the  hundreds  of  rodents, 
each  destructive  to  his  crops,  that  the  mink  took  care  of 
every  year.  And  like  all  men,  he  could  not  see  the  un- 
folding of  events. 

If  he  had  been  able  to,  perhaps  a  moment's  understand- 
ing of  the  mysteries  of  existence  might  have  come  to  him. 
He  would  have  known  that  every  living  creature  has  its 
mission  and  its  place,  from  the  buzzards  that  follow  the 
dead,  to  old  Woof  the  bear,  grunting  in  the  thickets.  Some 
were  created  to  keep  the  numbers  of  some  other  breed  in 
check,  some  were  to  clear  the  ground  of  certain  fast-spread- 
ing plants,  but  the  missions  of  many  of  them  are  too  obscure 
for  the  eyes  of  men  to  see. 

Hardman  did  not  think  about  these  things  as  he  climbed 
the  hill.  He  only  thought  about  the  growing  chill  in  the 
air  and  because  he  was  only  human,  he  listened  to  the  stir 
of  the  waking  forest  life  about  him. 

Little  Death  was  clever  at  many  things;  but  most  of 
all  he  surpassed  in  keeping  out  of  sight.  It  was  the  first 
lesson  his  mother  taught  him,  long  ago  in  the  grass  nest 
beside  the  river.  "Never  show  yourself  till  just  before 
the  leap,"  the  old  she-mink  had  said.  And  perhaps,  antici- 
pating even  then  the  rapture  of  ripping  out  a  jugular  vein 
with  his  ivory  teeth,  his  wicked  little  eyes  had  glowed  like 
two  rubies  in  the  velvet  fur.  For  the  leap  of  a  mink  is 
as  swift,  as  savage  a  thing  as  is  to  be  seen  in  all  the  savage 
wilderness,  and  usually  there  is  death  at  the  end  of  it.  Once 
to  see  it  is  to  understand  how  the  little  slayer  won  his  name. 

The  same  rule  held  when  Little  Death  was  the  hunted, 
rather  than  the  hunter:  to  lie  still  like  a  little  strip  of 
brown  mud  between  the  reed  stalks,  until  it  became  per- 


1 82     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

fectly  certain  that  his  enemy  had  seen  him  and  flight  was 
the  only  course.  For  Little  Death  had  many  enemies.  Mil- 
lions of  women,  all  over  the  broad  earth,  offered  much  gold 
for  his  soft  coat.  There  were  traps  in  plenty,  all  along 
the  Upper  Umpqua;  there  were  the  greater  beasts  of 
prey ;  and  the  wide-winged  marsh  owls  had  unpleasant  habits 
of  slipping  up  behind  him  when  least  expected.  These 
great  birds  had  wings  that  were  silence  itself,  claws  that 
were  sharp  and  deadly,  and  many  fledglings  always  hungry 
for  the  flesh  of  the  little  people  of  the  river.  Even  before 
he  had  left  the  nest,  Little  Death  had  had  nightmares 
of  the  two  blue  eyes  in  the  twilight. 

There  were  not  many  human  wayfarers  along  the  Upper 
Umpqua,  but  such  as  there  were  rarely  caught  sight  of 
him.  And  this  speaks  well  for  the  little  bandit's  ability 
to  conceal  himself.  The  few  trappers  and  hunters  that 
came  along  were  men  of  rather  exceptional  powers  of  vision. 
Mostly  they  were  lank,  dark  mountaineers  who  did  not  miss 
a  great  deal  of  what  was  going  on  about  them.  Though 
there  is  no  more  deceitful  jade  in  the  world  than  Mother 
Nature,  always  pretending  that  her  living  creatures  are 
just  patches  of  light  and  shadow,  most  of  these  mountaineers 
had  long  since  learned  her  wiles.  If  a  tenderfoot  should 
pass  within  five  paces  of  Little  Death's  body  and  fail  to 
see  him,  it  would  not  be  surprizing,  but  when  Amos 
Hardman,  he  who  had  lived  forty  years  on  the  Divide, 
did  just  this  thing,  it  was  something  for  the  forest  people 
to  talk  about.  One  can  even  imagine  a  wise  old  king- 
fisher, blue-coated  policeman  who  had  a  beat  on  a  certain 
ripple  of  the  Umpqua,  squawking  out  this  bit  of  scandal 
to  old  Woof  the  bear,  catching  crawfish  on  the  shore,  and 


Little  Death  183 

the  furry  old  fellow  sitting  back  on  his  tailless  haunches 
and  grunting  with  laughter. 

But  it  was  true  that  ordinarily,  human  beings  completely 
failed  to  see  the  little  people  of  the  river.  Of  course,  no 
one  could  fail  to  notice  Woof,  and  dull  are  the  eyes  that  are 
not  filled  with  delight  at  the  sight  of  the  black-tail  deer, 
drinking  at  the  water's  edge.  When  Whisperfoot,  the  cou- 
gar, cared  to  show  himself  at  all,  no  man  in  his  right  senses 
cared  to  look  the  other  way.  And  the  glory  of  the  elk  is  a 
name.  The  little  people,  however,  went  mostly  unobserved. 
They  were  physically  small,  their  coloration  was  highly  pro- 
tective, but  most  of  all  they  were  wary  and  elusive  as  so 
many  little  shadows.  Some  of  them  were  not  mammals  at 
all;  the  great  trout,  for  instance,  that  waved  lazy  tails 
at  the  still  bottoms  of  the  deep  pools.  Farther  down  the 
river  a  pair  of  beavers  made  engineering  plans  through 
the  long  night,  and  the  blue  heron  told  a  pair  of  little 
ruddy  ducks,  flirting  their  tails  in  a  certain  shallow,  that 
the  last  of  the  otters  had  established  himself  at  the  neck  of 
an  old  slough.  But  they  all  were  crafty  and  furtive  and 
shy  beyond  all  telling,  and  most  of  them,  like  Little  Death 
himself,  did  most  of  their  hunting  either  in  the  eery  hours 
of  twilight  or  at  night. 

This  particular  twilight  he  came  creeping  forth  from  a 
little  bunch  of  tall  reeds  on  the  river  bank.  No  one  could 
have  guessed,  one  minute  since,  that  the  few  yellow  stalks 
would  have  made  such  a  perfect  hiding  place.  The  hour 
was  late,  the  light  was  dim,  yet  one  little  moment  of  close 
scrutiny  would  have  sufficed  to  completely  change  one's  opin- 
ion about  Little  Death.  In  a  moment  one  would  cease 
to  think  of  him  as  an  insignificant  little  rat  of  the  river, 
and  would  know  him  for  what  he  was, — a  hunter  and  a 


1 84     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

killer,  more  blood-thirsty  than  a  tiger,  more  cunning  than 
a  fox,  more  savage  than  a  wolf. 

He  was  Little  Death,  the  mink,  less  in  size  than  a  rab- 
bit, but  as  fierce  and  terrible  a  hunter  as  is  known  in  the 
whole  wilderness  world.  His  little  red  eyes  burned  with 
a  wicked  light  as  he  took  the  trail. 

Nature  has  been  trying  a  long  time  to  secure  efficiency 
in  her  various  creatures.  She  has  always  been  improving 
her  types  and  her  methods  have  been  sure  but  exceedingly 
deadly.  It  was  just  a  simple  proposition  of  killing  off, 
by  process  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  all  the  less  efficient 
and  incapable  creatures.  She  has  made  mistakes,  but  few 
of  them  remain  to  clutter  up  the  earth.  And  once  or  twice 
she  has  achieved  a  positive  masterpiece. 

The  little  animal  that,  serpent-like,  came  slipping  out 
upon  the  game  trail  beside  the  river  was  really  nothing  less 
than  a  masterpiece  of  nature.  No  one  could  doubt  it,  to 
see  him  in  action.  It  isn't  known  that  nature  had  any 
efficiency  expert  to  help  her  out,  but  naturalists  do  know 
that  this  little  beast  of  prey,  in  his  own  sphere,  is  as  capable, 
effective,  and  withal  as  deadly  a  hunter  as  ever  followed 
a  trail.  He  is  just  as  effective  in  a  tree  as  on  the  ground, 
though  this  fact  isn't  relished  at  all  by  the  feathered  people 
that  make  nests  in  the  branches.  He  is  agile,  fleet  be- 
yond belief,  and  ferocious  up  to  his  last  breath. 

As  he  came  out  from  his  hiding-place,  he  did  not  make 
a  false  motion.  No  hare  could  have  moved  through  the 
reeds  more  swiftly  than  he.  He  really  had  no  limits.  He 
could  dart  up  a  tree  as  quickly  as  a  squirrel.  He  could  slip 
into  a  rabbit  burrow  or  a  hollow  tree  with  the  ease  of  a 
ferret.  If  he  wished,  he  could  range  far  from  his  native 
waters  and   keep  equally  well   fed.     And   even  the  great 


Little  Death  185 

lake  trout  in  the  pool  were  no  more  at  home  in  the  dim 
paths  of  the  river  bottoms  than  he. 

Scientists  can  tell  about  his  teeth — how  perfectly  they 
are  arranged  and  sharpened  for  a  life  of  rapine.  There 
have  been  trappers,  now  and  then,  who  have  carelessly 
gotten  their  hands  in  range  of  these  same  teeth,  and  ever 
thereafter  have  spoken  softly  every  time  the  name  of  Little 
Death  has  been  mentioned.  The  jaws  are  manipulated 
with  tremendous  bunches  of  muscles,  the  eyes  miss  little 
of  what  is  going  on  about  him,  the  nose  is  keen,  and  a 
thrown  blade  could  scarcely  equal  the  speed  of  his  leap. 
Many  and  strange  are  the  stories  of  his  ferocity,  his  death- 
less courage  and,  curiously,  most  of  them  are  true. 

A  rabbit  had  bounded  along  the  river  bank  earlier  in 
the  evening,  and  Little  Death  had  found  his  trail.  Just 
for  an  instant  he  stood  up  on  his  haunches,  like  a  squirrel, 
and  if  the  light  had  been  better  one  could  have  seen  a 
transformation  in  the  fierce  face  and  body.  He  seemed  to 
grow  more  furtive.  The  lips  drew  back,  revealing  a  gleam 
of  polished  ivory.  But  the  most  pronounced  change  of 
all  was  in  his  eyes. 

They  suddenly  became  little  points  of  reddish  flame.  Lit- 
tle Death's  blood  was  up.  The  rabbit  was  still  far  off, 
but  the  blood-madness  had  already  come  upon  him.  All 
flesh-eaters  know  this  passion — a  lust  to  heat  the  blood 
and  ignite  the  brain — but  in  none  of  them  is  it  more  pro- 
nounced than  in  Little  Death  and  his  fellows.  A  tiger, 
for  instance,  will  often  linger  over  its  wounded  prey.  For 
long  hours  it  will  administer  terrible  caresses  with  claws 
and  fangs,  but  this  cold  cruelty  is  unknown  in  the  mink. 
His  passion  is  too  great  for  that.    All  he  knows  is  to  slay, 


1 86     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

and  slay  quickly,  with  white  teeth  at  the  throat;  then  leap 
to  another  victim. 

Little  Death  stood  shivering,  with  the  fury  and  the 
madness  upon  him.  Then  he  started  stealing  down  the 
river.  But  all  at  once  he  halted  and  whipped  about  on 
his  hind  legs.  No  human  eyes  could  follow  that  motion. 
For  an  instant  he  crouched,  utterly  motionless,  and  his  red, 
fiery  eyes  searched  the  deepening  shadows.  He  wasn't  sure, 
but  it  seemed  to  him  that  a  deeper  shadow  had  flitted  across 
his  trail.  All  his  life,  Little  Death  had  known  this  same, 
curious  darkening  across  his  path.  He  had  wakened  from 
his  dreams  in  the  reeds  in  horror  of  it.  It  was  made  by 
only  one  thing, — the  swift  passage  of  wings. 

Little  Death's  eyes  were  keen;  yet  he  could  not  see  this 
far.  Perhaps  forty  yards  distant,  a  shadow  swept  across 
a  single  bright  star  that  had  pushed  through  the  twilight 
sky.  But  it  was  too  dark  and  far  away  for  even  a  mink 
to  see  plainly.  And  so  intent  was  he  upon  the  trail  that 
he  was  willing  to  disregard  it. 

And  disregarding  this  particular  shadow  was  one  thing 
his  mother  had  told  him,  every  time  the  dark  came  down, 
that  he  must  not  do.  It  was  the  deadliest  of  all  the  many 
deadly  mistakes  a  mink  can  make.  For  that  shadow  often 
means  the  presence  of  Velvet  Wings,  the  great  horned 
owl,  that  is  terror  itself  to  all  the  Little  People.  Velvet 
Wings  can  come  like  a  cloud,  and  his  talons  are  death.  His 
voice  alone,  in  the  silence,  is  enough  to  strike  terror  into 
all  the  little  folk  within  hearing.  But  the  silence  grew  and 
deepened  about  Little  Death,  and  he  kept  to  the  trail. 

By  now,  the  darkness  was  growing  over  the  lake  region. 
The  pines  still  stood  in  curious  silhouette  against  the  west- 
ern sky,  but  the  outline  of  even  the  close  tree  trunks  was 


Little  Death  187 

blurred  and  indistinct.  The  river  gleamed,  ever  so  softly. 
The  reeds  began  their  night  song,  that  curious  rustle  they 
make  as  the  wind  plays  over  them,  a  sound  that  lingers  long 
in  the  memory.    All  the  forest  world  was  wakening. 

It  was  the  hunting  hour,  and  Little  Death's  passion  grew 
upon  him.  There  seemed  to  be  something  in  the  air,  a  fever 
and  excitement  that  the  night  wind  had  brought  on.  He 
did  not  know  it,  but  farther  up  the  slope  Whisperfoot,  the 
cougar,  was  stalking  his  buck.  There  was  no  particular 
way  in  which  Little  Death  could  know  it,  because  cat-tail 
feathers,  falling  on  the  reeds,  make  more  sound  than  Whis- 
perfoot at  his  hunting.  Moreover,  he  is  tawny  and  hard 
to  see  in  the  shadows.  If  he  had  known,  the  mink  might 
have  been  more  wary.  The  great  cat  does  not  ordinarily 
attack  such  small  game  as  minks,  but  like  most  other  for- 
est creatures,  his  habits  are  not  entirely  known  and  never 
to  be  trusted. 

And  there  was  one  other  stirring  creature  in  the  same 
little  forest  patch  back  of  Hardman's  tent.  He  was  hunt- 
ing too,  but  not  for  food.  The  lowering  night  had  brought 
the  cold,  and  the  breed  to  which  Cold  Eye  belonged  was 
particularly  susceptible  to  the  lowering  of  the  temperature. 
Cold  Eye  was  looking  for  a  warm  place  to  lie  through  the 
night  and  must  make  haste. 

He  seemed  to  move  with  strange  stealth,  scarcely  a  leaf 
rustling  under  him.  Not  even  his  broken-glass  eyes  were 
visible  in  the  shadows.  He  crept  lower,  down  toward  Hard- 
man's  tent. 

But  the  man  was  still  on  the  hills,  and  did  not  see  Cold 
Eye  come.  For  certain  very  good  reasons,  Hardman  would 
have  taken  no  joy  in  this  visitation.     For  Cold  Eye  was 


188     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

known  far  through  the  forests,  a  creeper  in  the  dust  and  a 
seeker  of  warm  places  in  the  cold  nights.  He  was  the  great 
gray  rattlesnake  that  had  lain  all  day  on  the  ledge.  He 
was  old,  the  poison  glands  in  his  head  were  full,  and  the 
forest  creatures  scampered  off  the  trail  to  get  out  of  his  way. 

He  was  angry  because  the  deepening  cold  had  driven  him 
from  his  ledge,  and  his  savagery  had  grown  upon  him  as 
he  progressed  down  the  trail.  He  didn't  understand  the 
gray  wall  that  now  had  reared  in  front  of  him.  He  slipped 
slowly  under  it. 

Hardman  was  a  mountaineer,  brawn  and  bone,  and  his 
bed  was  a  pallet  of  boughs,  spread  on  the  ground  at  the 
mouth  of  the  tent.  His  blankets,  two  pairs  of  them,  were 
spread  on  top.  And  at  first  Cold  Eye  did  not  understand 
them. 

But  slowly  he  slipped  into  them,  into  the  warmth  and 
the  darkness.  Slowly  he  coiled,  till  at  last  only  a  gray 
circle,  deadly  past  all  things,  remained.  He  would  sleep 
here  through  the  night,  he  thought.  He  would  strike  with 
deadly  fangs  any  one  that  came  to  disturb  him.  Only  his 
head  was  exposed. 

On  the  hill  above,  Amos  Hardman  had  finished  his  work. 
It  had  been  a  hard  day,  and  he  was  tired.  He  thought  with 
pleasure  how  he  would  swiftly  remove  his  boots  and  trousers, 
and  leap  between  the  blankets. 

He  would  sleep  well,  he  thought,  at  least  if  that  worth- 
less existence,  the  mink,  did  not  revisit  his  hen  roost  during 
the  night.  Yes,  he  would  sleep  well,  for  Cold  Eye  would 
be  waiting  with  bared  fangs  for  any  one  who  would  contest 
the  bed  with  him.  And  all  things  slept  well  after  Cold 
Eye  had  spoken  to  them. 


Little  Death  189 

The  darkness  had  fallen,  by  now,  but  the  moon  was  up — 
otherwise  it  would  have  been  too  dark  for  even  Little  Death 
to  hunt.  It  made  a  curious  patchwork  of  light  and  shadow 
on  the  trail;  it  worked  strange  miracles  with  the  many 
ripples  and  waterfalls  of  the  river,  changing  them  seemingly 
to  wondrous  works  in  silver;  it  glinted  on  the  tops  of  the 
pines.  The  rabbit  trail  circled  back,  and  Little  Death  had 
made  the  circuit  when  the  shadow  fell  again.  But  it  was 
behind  him,  and  he  didn't  see  it.  Neither  did  he  see  the 
two  circles  of  blue  fire  that  for  an  instant  burned  at  him 
out  of  the  shadows.  The  trail  was  growing  hot,  and  the 
only  emotion  he  had  left  was  anticipation  of  the  killing 
that  was  to  come.  He  had  quite  forgotten  that  Velvet 
Wings  also  kept  watch  over  this  same  hunting  ground, 
or  he  would  not  have  sped  forward  so  gaily. 

Once  more  he  paused  to  listen  to  a  long-drawn  howl 
from  the  thickets  at  one  side.  It  was  a  curious,  angry,  dis- 
appointed sound ;  and  if  Little  Death's  intellect  had  been  just 
a  little  greater,  he  might  have  understood.  Whisperfoot 
had  missed  his  stroke.  His  paw  had  whipped  down  a  frac- 
tion of  a  second  too  late,  and  the  buck  was  a  streak  in  the 
darkness  by  now.  This  was  never  soothing  to  Whisper- 
foot's  disposition.  He  was  angry,  and  he  didn't  care  who 
knew  it.     The  sound  chopped  squarely  off  in  the  middle. 

But  if  Little  Death  had  known  the  little  drama  that 
immediately  followed,  he  would  have  been  really  vitally 
interested.  Just  in  the  last  notes  of  his  howl,  a  shadow  had 
suddenly  leaped  across  Whisperfoot's  nose.  It  is  an  old 
saying  in  the  forest  that  a  cougar  has  always  one  jump 
left  in  him.  Whisperfoot  had  just  that  one  jump,  and 
he  gave  it,  fast  as  light.  It  was  not  very  big  game.  It  was 
just  a  rabbit  speeding  in  stark  terror  up  the  slope.     But  it 


190     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

had  come  too  suddenly  and  was  gone  too  quick  for  even 
the  cougar's  lightning  blow  to  overtake  it.  The  long, 
meat-hook  talons  dug  into  the  earth  a  half  inch  behind  the 
little  white  tail. 

Whisperfoot  started  to  howl  again,  but  abruptly  bethought 
himself  better  of  it.  He  had  an  idea.  It  seems  to  be  true 
that  no  animal,  excepting  man,  can  really  reason;  thus 
Whisperfoot's  curious  behavior  can  hardly  be  ascribed  to 
actual  reasoning  and  foresight.  Perhaps  it  was  simply  an 
inspiration, — instinct  developed  to  the  last  degree.  Whis- 
perfoot simply  seemed  to  know  that  in  just  a  moment  some 
beast  of  prey  would  come  darting  along  that  way  on  the 
rabbit's  trail. 

He  didn't  know  just  what  kind  of  beast  it  might  be. 
He  didn't  care.  He  was  sufficiently  strong  and  large  to 
master  any  other  flesh-eater  of  the  Oregon  forest,  unless,  by 
a  liberal  interpretation,  one  would  call  Woof  a  flesh-eater. 
Were  it  a  fisher  or  a  wildcat  or  even  a  wolf,  Whisperfoot 
need  not  be  afraid.  And  Woof,  the  bear,  would  no  more 
attempt  to  catch  a  rabbit  than  he  would  try  to  bite  off 
his  own  diminutive  tail.  He  was  quite  a  foolish  old  bear 
at  times,  especially  when  the  love-sickness  was  on  him  in 
the  fall,  but  he  had  never  been  that  foolish. 

The  idea  had  no  more  than  occurred  to  Whisperfoot,  and 
his  muscles  had  set  (because  in  animals  there  is  no  time 
lost  between  an  idea  and  its  muscular  response)  than  he  knew 
he  had  guessed  the  truth.  Little  feet  came  scratching  along 
in  the  dead  leaves.  They  were  coming  swiftly  and,  indeed, 
they  were  very  little.  But  Whisperfoot  had  missed  his 
stroke  and  anything  in  the  way  of  flesh  was  acceptable. 

And  if  the  bright  eyes  of  Velvet  Wings  were  watch- 
ing from  the  sky,  perhaps  the  great  owl  thought  he  was 


Little  Death  191 


to  be  cheated  after  all.  He  came  winging  down  the  trail  but 
a  short  distance  ahead  of  Amos  Hardman  on  the  way  to 
his  tent  and  his  bed. 

Little  Death  was  running  straight  into  the  cougar's  am- 
bush. Whisperfoot  would  not  miss  this  time.  He  would 
gauge  his  stroke  correctly.  And  except  for  one  little  prank 
of  the  forest  gods — those  spirits  whose  sport  it  is  to  watch 
the  everchanging  drama  of  the  wilderness — Little  Death 
would  have  known  no  further  adventures  that  night.  Whis- 
perfoot was  crouched  in  the  shadow  but  the  moonlight 
probed  through  and  reflected  in  his  eyes. 

Just  for  an  instant  they  flashed  like  singular  blue  electric 
bulbs,  two  circles,  close  together,  in  the  darkness.  The  eyes 
of  the  mink  were  red  with  passion  and  blood  lust — for 
he  was  hot  upon  the  rabbit's  trail — but  they  were  not  so 
blind  that  he  did  not  discern  the  warning.  Since  his  earliest 
kittenhood  he  had  known  about  the  two  blue  danger  sig- 
nals in  the  darkness. 

It  was  not  that  he  had  ever  encountered  Whisperfoot 
before.  Rather  it  was  just  a  matter  of  instinct,  an  instinct 
all  living  creatures  possess,  that  such  twin  moons  mean  dan- 
ger. The  eyes  of  Velvet  Wings  himself  had  these  same  sur- 
face lights;  and  that  fact  alone  was  enough  to  draw  the 
mink  up  short  in  his  tracks. 

If  he  had  raced  on  twelve  more  inches,  he  would  have 
never  got  past  the  ambush  alive.  If  he  had  stopped  in 
his  tracks  for  one  half  of  a  breath,  Whisperfoot  would  have 
reached  out  a  barbed  paw  and  snatched  away  his  life.  But 
he  did  neither  of  these  things.  Whisperfoot  struck,  but 
before  the  paw  landed  Little  Death  had  leaped  aside.  If  he 
surpassed  at  nothing  else,  he  knew  how  to  dodge,  and  his 


192    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

muscles  were  chain  lightning  itself.  Whisperfoot  struck 
with  his  other  paw,  and  Little  Death  dodged  again. 

The  rabbit  was  at  once  forgotten.  Little  Death  was 
dodging  for  his  life.  Twice  more  the  claws  came  down 
within  an  inch  of  his  furry  body,  and  by  now  Whisperfoot 
was  striking  all  about  him  and  he  would  have  suggested 
to  Woof's  grim  sense  of  humor  a  human  being  vainly  strik- 
ing at  a  mosquito.  Then  Little  Death  gathered  himself 
for  a  great  spring  and  leaped  full  over  Whisperfoot's  low- 
hung  head.     Then  he  darted  away  through  the  tall  grass. 

Whisperfoot  chased  him,  striking  at  him  again  and  again, 
but  always  when  the  paw  came  down  Little  Death  was 
elsewhere.  The  mink  cut  back,  made  a  swift  circle,  and 
a  moment  more  was  at  the  river  bank.  The  cougar  under- 
stood these  tactics.  Once  more  he  leaped  at  the  brown 
serpent  in  the  air,  and  except  for  the  luckiest  chance  would 
have  fallen  into  the  river.  And  that  would  have  given 
the  forest  people  something  to  laugh  about  for  a  half- 
dozen  moons. 

Little  Death  struck  the  water  with  a  splash,  and  was  im- 
mediately out  of  his  sight.  It  was  his  own  element.  His 
claws  were  semi-webbed,  and  he  took  the  ripples  like  a 
salmon.  The  chase  had  lost  its  terror  for  him.  One  hun- 
dred feet  down  the  river  he  pulled  up  on  the  bank,  his 
fur  sleek  and  close-lying  from  the  water. 

He  drew  himself  up,  perhaps  intending  to  utter  his 
chattering  laugh  of  scorn  at  the  cougar  on  the  opposite 
shore.  Perhaps  he  was  listening  to  the  nearing  footsteps 
of  Hardman,  on  the  way  to  his  tent.  In  fact,  Whisper- 
foot, angry  and  disappointed,  was  already  slinking  back 
into  the  shadows  as  inconspicuously  as  possible.  But  Little 
Death's  laugh  was  never  uttered. 


Little  Death  193 

He  crawled  up  the  bank  into  the  very  mouth  of  Hard- 
man's  tent  and  his  little  red  eyes  saw  what  Hardman  never 
could  have  hoped  to  see:  the  head  of  Cold  Eye,  the  serpent, 
stretching  from  the  blankets.  Cold  Eye  also  had  heard 
the  man's  step,  and  was  waiting  with  lifted  head  for 
any  one  that  came. 

If  any  one  of  a  number  of  things  had  been  different 
from  what  they  were,  a  certain  fight  to  the  death  on  the 
shores  of  the  Umpqua  would  have  never  come  to  pass.  For 
it  is  true  that  few  mink  in  their  right  senses  would  care 
to  attack  a  full-grown  rattlesnake.  In  the  first  place,  old 
Cold  Eye  was  a  wonderfully  efficient  hunter  on  his  own 
account.  His  bulk  was  many  times  that  of  Little  Death. 
And  even  the  meager  intellect  of  a  mink  knew  that  one 
little  scratch  of  the  loose-hung  fangs  was  simply  death 
with  just  a  few  moments  of  quivering  in  between. 

But  Little  Death  was  feeling  unusually  sure  of  himself 
to-night.  He  had  just  extricated  himself  from  the  claws 
of  a  cougar,  and  this  was  a  legend  to  pass  down  to  his 
children.  Besides,  his  blood  was  up  from  the  excitement 
of  the  chase.  And  lastly,  he  was  angry  all  over  at  the 
rabbit's  escape.  It  would  be  hard  to  imagine  so  many 
emotions  flooding  him  at  once,  but  their  combined  effect 
was  to  put  him  on  fighting  edge.  The  sight  of  the  rattler, 
suddenly  looming  just  in  front  of  him,  the  blood-smell, 
and  the  realization  that  there  was  the  noblest  game  he  had 
ever  faced  was  like  a  spark  to  powder. 

He  seemed  to  puff  out.  The  wet  hair  erected  all  at  once, 
and  in  one  second  seemed  to  be  dry.  The  light  danced  in 
his  eyes.  The  muscles  set  and  contracted  seemingly  with- 
out conscious  effort,  and  he  sprang  fast  as  a  light  shaft  to- 
ward the  serpent's  throat. 


194     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

Then  there  began  the  grim  and  terrible  battle  that  the 
little  people  of  the  river  came  out  to  see.  Cold  Eye  was 
not  to  be  felled  by  that  first  attack.  The  head  swayed 
aside,  then  the  long  body  lunged  out.  It  came  like  a  spear 
comes,  almost  straight  in  the  air  and  faster  than  the  eye 
could  follow.  Little  Death  rolled  back  and  over,  and  both 
contestants  found  themselves  in  the  moonlight,  clear  out- 
side the  mouth  of  the  tent. 

Little  Death  got  in  his  bite  as  the  snake  came  down,  but 
he  almost  died  to  pay  for  it.  Cold  Eye's  head  whipped 
back,  and  the  mink's  leap  to  safety  was  none  too  soon.  The 
flat  head  seemed  to  graze  his  shoulder. 

Two  of  the  most  agile,  the  most  indomitable  slayers  in 
the  whole  wilderness  world  were  matched  on  the  river 
bank  that  night, — cold  fury  on  the  part  of  Cold  Eye  and 
savage  ferocity  on  that  of  Little  Death.  The  moon  showed 
the  whole  thing.  The  entire  wilderness  world  seemed  to 
stop  in  its  business  and  look.  The  two  fought  almost  in 
silence,  so  little  sound  that  even  the  song  that  the  wind 
played  in  the  marsh  reeds  was  not  obscured. 

It  is  true  that  Cold  Eye  hissed  as  he  turned  to  parry 
Little  Death's  lunges.  But  it  was  only  a  faint  sound,  dying 
quickly  in  the  silence  of  the  night  and  charged  full  of  the 
icy  hatred  of  which  the  snake  is  the  embodiment.  And 
perhaps  the  mink's  light  feet  rustled  and  crinkled  in  the 
leaves.  It  was  almost  as  if  he  were  dancing — some  savage 
dance  of  death  about  a  victim — so  lightly  did  he  spring  back 
and  forth.  The  whole  fight  was  misty  and  unreal  in  the 
moonlight:  two  strange  figures  in  a  dance  of  death.  Only 
once  did  the  rattles  sound :  that  far-carrying  warning,  sharp 
and  high,  that  is  as  menacing  an  articulation  as  is  ever  heard 
in  the  wilderness.     It  was  more  than   that.     All  that  is 


Little  Death  195 

deadly,  all  the  lightning  perils  that  can  fall  so  swiftly  on 
the  dwellers  of  the  Wild  were  symbolized  in  that  piercing 
note. 

Little  Death  danced  about  him,  lunging  in  again  and 
again:  stroke  and  parry,  gleaming  teeth  and  darting  head, 
bunching  muscles  and  lightning  lunge,  bite  and  scratch  and 
little  wicked  eyes  burning  out  of  the  savage  face.  The  ser- 
pent was  more  stately,  bowing  almost  like  a  dancer  in  a 
minuet.  He  swayed  gently,  until  he  thought  he  saw  his 
opening.  Then  the  long  head  would  lunge  out  and  thwack 
down,  and  not  even  the  eyes  of  the  wild  creatures  were 
trained  enough  to  follow  that  motion. 

Little  Death  seemed  so  lithe,  so  slender,  so  unbelievably 
agile  that  he  gave  almost  a  reptile  appearance  himself.  The 
flat,  savage  head  helped  out  the  delusion;  only  the  wicked 
teeth  revealed  his  true  raptorial  character.  Cold  Eye  had 
felt  their  sting  a  half-dozen  times,  but  they  had  never 
reached  a  vital  place  and  the  mink  had  been  afraid  to  bite 
too  long  and  deep.  The  whipping  head  of  the  snake  was 
looking  for  just  that  chance. 

Little  Death's  rage  grew  upon  him  with  every  passing 
second.  The  hair  stood  straight  until  he  looked  three 
times  his  natural  size.  Ever  he  leaped  faster,  ever  his  wicked 
little  eyes  had  a  more  lurid  flame.  Cold  Eye,  however, 
still  lived  up  to  his  name.  Something  glittered  on  either 
side  of  the  flat  head  like  bits  of  broken  glass,  strangely 
bright,  but  cold  enough  to  freeze  the  blood  in  the  veins 
and  paralyze  the  muscles.  Little  Death  knew  enough  not 
to  meet  those  eyes.  In  a  fight  where  it  was  leap  against 
leap,  fang  against  fang,  he  had  a  fair  chance  of  living  to 
tell  of  it,  but  a  battle  of  eyes  with  a  reptile  was  a  different 
matter.     Little   Death   was  a  blood-spiller,   but  he   didn't 


196    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

know  black  magic.  For  though  naturalists  deny  it  to  the 
chapter's  end,  there  is  a  power  in  the  gold,  glittering  eye 
of  a  serpent,  and  for  the  little  people  to  meet  it  is  to  be 
frozen  in  their  tracks.  A  cold  priestess  to  all  that  is  deadly 
and  merciless, — that  was  the  serpent,  fighting  in  the  moon- 
light. 

It  was  an  incredibly  graceful  thing,  this  battle  on  the 
river's  bank.  Sometimes  their  shadows,  as  they  hung  on 
the  water's  edge,  danced  off  across  the  ripples.  Little  Death 
hopped  back  and  forth,  now  darting  almost  as  Cold  Eye 
darted,  now  swaying  on  his  haunches,  now  leaping,  now  re- 
coiling, but  always  staying  just  out  of  the  reach  of  Cold 
Eye's  lashing  head.     Mostly  they  fought  in  eerie  silence. 

If  the  serpent  had  been  fighting  any  other  creature  than 
a  mink  and  had  been  in  the  least  afraid  of  being  conquered, 
he  would  have  sprung  immediately  into  the  water.  It  is 
one  of  the  ways  of  serpents  to  make  a  swift  path  across  a 
river.  But  he  knew  enough  not  to  try  these  tactics  here. 
If  the  serpent  were  a  water  dog,  Little  Death  was  a  fish. 
The  wild  waters  were  the  smaller  creature's  own  element, 
and  he  would  have  had  every  advantage. 

Again  and  again  Cold  Eye  got  in  savage  blows,  strokes 
that  didn't  go  quite  true  yet,  in  which  the  flat  head  had 
pummeled  the  mink's  sides;  and  Little  Death  was  fright- 
fully shaken  and  bruised  by  the  furious  jerk  and  recoil  of 
the  long  body  every  time  he  himself  had  been  able  to  get 
in  a  bite.  But  it  is  a  trait  in  the  nature  of  a  mink  never 
to  give  up,  once  embroiled  in  a  fight.  This  tradition  of 
their  courage  has  carried  far  through  the  wilderness,  not 
without  cause.  His  fury  increased  and  with  it  his  effec- 
tiveness. Ever  he  seemed  quicker  of  recoil.  So  absorbed 
was  he  that  he  could  give  no  heed  to  any  other  danger: 


Little  Death  197 

a  dozen  shadows  could  have  flitted  across  the  glinting  river 
and  he  would  never  have  seen  them.  Nor  did  he  hear 
the  descending  feet  of  Amos  Hardman,  on  the  way  to  his 
tent.  Perhaps,  with  one  little  successful  lunge,  Cold  Eye 
could  yet  win  the  battle  in  time  to  go  back  to  the  blankets 
to  keep  company  with  the  warm  human  figure.  Not  that 
it  would  be  warm  all  night.  Warmth  dies  from  the  veins 
after  the  rattler's  bite. 

Once  more  the  snake  lunged  out.  It  was  almost  fatal 
to  Little  Death.  The  fangs  combed  the  fur  on  his  shoulder. 
The  weight  and  velocity  of  the  head  knocked  him  aside,  and 
the  snake  darted  forward  to  strike  again.  And  this  was 
a  mistake. 

The  snake  was  not  quite  in  the  best  position  for  a  blow. 
Too  much  of  his  length  was  already  stretched  out.  But 
the  truth  was,  he  had  seen  Little  Death  rolled  head  over 
heels,  and  he  had  not  quite  the  proper  respect  for  the  mink's 
ability  to  recoil.  "There  are  none  so  swift,  so  agile  as  I," 
he  tells  the  wicked-eyed  little  sons  of  him  in  the  serpent  nest, 
and  Cold  Eye  thought  that  he  himself  wouldn't  have  been 
able  to  snap  back  to  a  position  of  battle  before  the  poisoned 
fangs  could  sink  home.  But  he  had  failed  to  consider  the 
fact  that  a  mink  is  almost,  if  not  quite,  a  masterpiece  of 
nature. 

It  all  transpired  so  quickly  that  even  the  little  people  that 
watched  the  fight  did  not  quite  discern  the  details.  For  the 
smallest,  littlest  fraction  of  a  second,  less  than  stop-watch 
could  measure,  Little  Death  seemed  to  lie  still  from  the 
force  of  the  blow.  The  snake's  glittering  eyes  saw  the 
posture,  and  he  lunged  down  far  out,  with  the  full  force 
and  length  of  his  body.     But  when  he  was  in  the  air,  a 


198     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

wonderful  transformation  occurred  in  the  little,  still  hand- 
ful of  brown  fur. 

All  at  once,  Little  Death  uncoiled  like  a  spring.  He 
leaped  to  one  side,  at  the  very  fraction  of  a  second  that 
the  head  darted  past.  Cold  Eye  had  sprung  too  far  to 
recoil.  The  white  teeth  flashed,  cut,  buried  deep,  and  closed 
— fairly  on  the  serpent's  spine.  Cold  Eye  would  paralyze 
no  more  fledglings  in  their  tracks.  Although  his  clammy 
tail  would  have  certain  motion  for  some  hours,  he  was 
simply  and  assuredly  dead.  The  battle  had  waged  out  from 
Amos'  tent  and  the  long  body  lay  fifteen  feet  in  the  shadows 
from  the  door.     Little  Death  had  lived  up  to  his  name. 

He  seemed  very  small  but  wholly  deadly  as  he  investi- 
gated the  wound.  The  blood-madness,  of  which  the  weasel 
tribe  are  particularly  susceptible,  was  on  him  even  from 
this  cold  blood.  He  chattered  in  his  rapture  and  ferocity. 
Once  more  he  danced  about  the  body,  as  if  in  triumph. 

But  the  curtain  had  not  yet  fallen  on  the  little  drama 
of  the  river. 

In  the  middle  of  his  triumphal  dance,  a  shadow  swooped 
to  the  earth.  So  fast  it  came  that  there  seemed  to  be  no 
break  in  the  flood  of  moonlight.  It  sped  out  of  the  dark 
sky,  and  it  swept,  faster  than  a  man  may  sweep  his  arm, 
along  the  moonlit  river  margin.  And  before  the  river  peo- 
ple could  blink  their  eyes,  the  dead  rattlesnake  was  left 
lying  still  and  alone  in  the  reeds. 

Velvet  Wings,  the  great  owl,  had  seen  his  chance  at  last. 
He  had  dipped  out  of  the  air,  swooped  on  his  silent  wings 
over  the  battle  scene,  and  even  now  was  darting  away  with 
Little  Death  held  fast  in  his  talons. 

"The  end  of  Little  Death,"  the  little  people  said,  as  the 
shadow  passed. 


Little  Death  199 

But  it's  a  strange  thing  about  the  world  that  there  is 
always  one  more  card  in  the  sleeve  of  Fate.  It  was  played 
then. 

There  was  an  astounding  explosion  out  of  the  dark- 
ness. It  wasn't  just  a  small-sized  sound,  or  even  a  fairly 
large  sound.  It  was  an  incredible  bellow  and  roar  that 
seemed  to  make  the  air  crack  and  rock  about  them.  In  the 
silence,  it  was  a  sound  to  strike  deaf  all  who  heard  it.  The 
little  people  simply  tumbled  over  backward  with  astonish- 
ment and  terror. 

The  shadow  that  was  over  the  river  abruptly  dipped  in 
its  flight.  It  wavered  strangely,  and  something  fell  out 
of  its  talons,  little  Death's  luck  was  with  him  after  all. 
He  struck,  not  the  rocky  shore,  but  the  glinting  water  of 
the  river,  and  Little  Death  was  known  far  as  a  high- 
diver.  He  was  bleeding  from  the  battle  with  Cold  Eye  and 
from  the  claws  of  Velvet  Wings,  but  neither  of  these  things 
had  made  him  forget  how  to  swim.  He  struck  off  boldly, 
among  the  dim  passages  of  the  sunken  logs,  and  sped  to 
safety. 

And  it  was  all  because  Amos  Hardman  had  returned 
with  his  shotgun.  He  hadn't  come  in  time  to  get  in  bed 
with  Cold  Eye.  In  fact,  he  didn't  even  know  that  the  reptile 
had  called  on  him,  for  the  serpent's  body  was  obscured 
in  the  shadows,  fifteen  feet  distant.  He  came  just  in  time 
to  see  the  shadow  of  the  owl  in  the  moonlight  and,  likely 
enough,  Amos  Hardman  was  still  thinking  of  his  chickens. 
In  fact,  it  was  one  of  the  few  subjects  Amos  Hardman — 
and  a  good  many  other  farmers  as  well — ever  did  think 
about.  Likely  enough  this  owl  was  flying  away  with  one 
of  them. 

He  had  thrown  his  shotgun  to  his  shoulder  and  fired. 


200    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

He  hadn't  stopped  to  take  aim.  He  was  too  angry  at  the 
threatened  loss  of  his  fowl.  The  report  was  the  sound  the 
little  people  had  heard,  by  which  they  were  still  almost 
petrified  from  terror.  The  truth  was  that  Amos  had  shot 
very  badly;  otherwise  he  could  have  hardly  missed  the 
great  form  of  the  owl.  All  he  succeeded  in  doing  was  to 
sink  a  few  shots  into  the  feathers  and  along  the  skin,  and 
the  only  result,  besides  terror,  was  a  sudden  relaxation  of 
the  bird's  muscles  that  caused  him  to  dip  in  his  flight  and 
open  his  claws.  Of  course  the  rascally  mink  had  fallen 
out, — safely  into  the  river. 

Amos  Hardman  heard  the  splash,  and  at  first  he  didn't 
understand  why  he  couldn't  see  the  clump  of  feathers 
that  would  mean  one  of  his  fowls  floating  down  the  moon- 
illumined  river.  But  he  did  see  a  black  head  that  for  an 
instant  came  up  right  in  the  middle  of  a  glinting  patch 
of  water.  And  he  was  smitten  with  horror  at  a  sudden 
suspicion  that  came  into  his  mind. 

"May  I  be  strung  up !"  he  suddenly  exploded.  "That  owl 
was  carryin'  off  the  mink — and  I  made  her  drop  him!" 

He  turned  into  his  tent,  almost  speechless  with  self- 
wrath.  "The  ornery  little  thief,"  he  roared.  "The  most 
worthless,  useless,  plague-take-it  varmint  on  the  earth !  What 
was  he  made  for,  anyway — blast  his  thievin',  bloodthirsty 
ways.     I'll  get  traps  and  get  him  yet!" 

If  the  mink,  one  hundred  yards  down  the  river,  had 
heard,  he  might  have  leaned  back  upon  his  haunches  and 
laughed  his  scorn.  Why  should  he  fear  the  traps  of  men? 
They  could  only  continue  to  give  him  a  life  of  zestful 
adventure.  The  years  would  pass,  still  to  find  him  fishing 
and  hunting  and  thieving  and  fighting  his  deadly  fights  in 


Little  Death  201 

the  twilight, — the  very  rogue  and  rascal  that  Nature  or- 
dained him  to  be.  His  useless  existence  would  continue  for 
some  time  yet;  while  out  in  the  shadows  the  last  muscular 
quiver  of  Cold  Eye's  tail  had  begun  to  die. 


THE  ELEPHANT  REMEMBERS 

The  hill-folk  say  that  a  great  ghost-elephant  is  sometimes  seen 
in  their  deepest  jungles,  a  gray-haired  mahout  is  ever  with  him, 
companion  in  his  games  and  revels. — From  the  Memoirs  of  a 
Traveler. 

An  elephant  is  old  on  the  day  he  is  born,  say  the  natives 
of  Burma,  and  no  white  man  is  ever  quite  sure  just  what 
they  mean.  Perhaps  they  refer  to  his  pink,  old-gentleman's 
skin  and  his  droll,  fumbling,  old-man  ways,  and  his  squeak- 
ing treble  voice.  And  maybe  they  mean  he  is  born  with  a 
wisdom  such  as  usually  belongs  only  to  age.  And  it  is  true 
that  if  any  animal  in  the  world  has  had  a  chance  to  acquire 
knowledge  it  is  the  elephant,  for  his  breed  are  the  oldest 
residents  of  this  old  world. 

They  are  so  old  that  they  don't  seem  to  belong  to  the 
twentieth  century  at  all.  Their  long  trunks,  their  huge 
shapes,  all  seem  part  of  the  remote  past.  They  are  just  the 
remnants  of  a  breed  that  once  was  great. 

Long  and  long  ago,  when  the  world  was  very  young 
indeed,  when  the  mountains  were  new,  and  before  the  descent 
of  the  great  glaciers  taught  the  meaning  of  cold,  they  were 
the  rulers  of  the  earth,  but  they  have  been  conquered  in  the 
struggle  for  existence.  Their  great  cousins,  the  mastodon 
and  the  mammoth,  are  completely  gone,  and  their  own  tribe 
can  now  be  numbered  by  thousands. 

But  because  they  have  been  so  long  upon  the  earth,  be- 
cause they  have  wealth  of  experience  beyond  all  other  crea- 
tures, they  seem  like  venerable  sages  in  a  world  of  children. 


The  Elephant  Remembers       203 

They  are  like  the  last  veterans  of  an  old  war,  who  can 
remember  scenes  and  faces  that  all  others  have  forgotten. 


Far  in  a  remote  section  of  British  India,  in  a  strange, 
wild  province  called  Burma,  Muztagh  was  born.  And 
although  he  was  born  in  captivity,  the  property  of  a  mahout, 
in  his  first  hour  he  heard  the  far-off  call  of  the  wild  ele- 
phants in  the  jungle. 

The  Burmans,  just  like  the  other  people  of  India,  always 
watch  the  first  hour  of  a  baby's  life  very  closely.  They 
know  that  always  some  incident  will  occur  that  will  point, 
as  a  weather-vane  points  in  the  wind,  to  the  baby's  future. 
Often  they  have  to  call  a  man  versed  in  magic  to  interpret, 
but  sometimes  the  prophecy  is  quite  self-evident.  No  one 
knows  whether  or  not  it  works  the  same  with  baby  elephants, 
but  certainly  this  wild,  far-carrying  call,  not  to  be  imitated 
by  any  living  voice,  did  seem  a  token  and  an  omen  in  the 
life  of  Muztagh.  And  it  is  a  curious  fact  that  the  little 
baby  lifted  his  ears  at  the  sound  and  rocked  back  and  forth 
on  his  pillar  legs. 

Of  all  the  places  in  the  great  world,  only  a  few  remain 
wherein  a  captive  elephant  hears  the  call  of  his  wild  brethren 
at  birth.  Muztagh's  birthplace  lies  around  the  corner  of 
the  Bay  of  Bengal,  not  far  from  the  watershed  of  the 
Irawadi,  almost  north  of  the  Malay  peninsula.  It  is  strange 
and  wild  and  dark  beyond  the  power  of  words  to  tell.  There 
are  great  dark  forests,  unknown,  slow-moving  rivers,  and 
jungles  silent  and  dark  and  impenetrable. 

Little  Muztagh  weighed  a  flat  two  hundred  pounds  at 
birth.     But  this  was  not  the  queerest  thing  about  him.     Ele- 


204    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

phant  babies,  although  usually  weighing  not  more  than  one 
hundred  and  eighty,  often  touch  two  hundred.  The  queerest 
thing  was  a  peculiarity  that  probably  was  completely  over- 
looked by  his  mother.  If  she  saw  it  out  of  her  dull  eyes, 
she  took  no  notice  of  it.  It  was  not  definitely  discovered 
until  the  mahout  came  out  of  his  hut  with  a  lighted  fagot 
for  a  first  inspection.  i 

He  had  been  wakened  by  the  sound  of  the  mother's  pain. 
"Hail"  he  had  exclaimed  to  his  wife.  "Who  has  ever  heard 
a  cow  bawl  so  loud  in  labor  ?  The  little  one  that  to-morrow 
you  will  see  beneath  her  belly  must  weigh  more  than  you!" 

This  was  rather  a  compliment  to  his  plump  wife.  She 
was  not  offended  at  all.  Burman  women  love  to  be  well- 
rounded.  But  the  mahout  was  not  weighing  the  effect  of 
his  words.  He  was  busy  lighting  his  firebrand,  and  his 
features  seemed  sharp  and  intent  when  the  beams  came  out. 
Rather  he  was  already  weighing  the  profits  of  little  Muztagh. 
He  was  an  elephant  catcher  by  trade,  in  the  employ  of  the 
great  white  Dugan  Sahib,  and  the  cow  that  was  at  this 
moment  bringing  a  son  into  the  world  was  his  own  property. 
If  the  baby  should  be  of  the  Kumiria 

The  mahout  knew  elephants  from  head  to  tail,  and  he 
was  very  well  acquainted  with  the  three  grades  that  com- 
pose that  breed.  The  least  valuable  of  all  are  the  Mierga, — 
a  light,  small-headed,  thin-skinned,  weak-trunked  and  un- 
intelligent variety  that  are  often  found  in  the  best  elephant 
herds.  They  are  often  born  of  the  most  noble  parents, 
and  they  are  as  big  a  problem  to  elephant  men  as  razor- 
backs  to  hog  breeders.  Then  there  is  a  second  variety,  the 
Dwasala,  that  composed  the  great  bulk  of  the  herd, — a  good, 
substantial,  strong,  intelligent  grade  of  elephant.  But  the 
Kumiria  is  the  best  of  all;  and  when  one  is  born  in  a  cap- 


The  Elephant  Remembers       205 

tive  herd  it  is  a  time  for  rejoicing.  He  is  the  perfect  ele- 
phant— heavy,  symmetrical,  trustworthy  and  fearless — fitted 
for  the  pageantry  of  kings. 

He  hurried  out  to  the  lines,  for  now  he  knew  that  the 
baby  was  born.  The  mother's  cries  had  ceased.  The  jungle, 
dark  and  savage  past  ever  man's  power  to  tame,  lay  just 
beyond.  He  could  feel  its  heavy  air,  its  smells;  its  silence 
was  an  essence.  And  as  he  stood,  lifting  the  fagot  high,  he 
heard  the  wild  elephants  trumpeting  from  the  hills. 

He  turned  his  head  in  amazement.  A  Burman,  and  par- 
ticularly one  who  chases  the  wild  elephants  in  their  jungles, 
is  intensely  superstitious,  and  for  an  instant  it  seemed  to  him 
that  the  wild  trumpeting  must  have  some  secret  meaning, 
it  was  so  loud  and  triumphant  and  prolonged.  It  was 
greatly  like  the  far-famed  elephant  salute — ever  one  of  the 
mysteries  of  those  most  mysterious  animals — that  the  great 
creatures  utter  at  certain  occasions  and  times. 

"Are  you  saluting  this  little  one?"  he  cried.  "He  is 
not  a  wild  tusker  like  you.  He  is  not  a  wild  pig  in  the 
jungle.  He  is  born  in  bonds,  such  as  you  will  wear  too, 
after  the  next  drive!" 

They  trumpeted  again,  as  if  in  scorn  of  his  words.  Their 
great  strength  was  given  them  to  rule  the  jungle,  not 
to  haul  logs  and  pull  chains!  The  man  turned  back  to 
the  lines  and  lifted  higher  his  light. 

Yes — the  little  elephant  in  the  light-glow  was  of  the 
Kumiria.  Never  had  there  been  a  more  perfect  calf.  The 
light  of  greed  sprang  again  in  his  eyes.  And  as  he  held  the 
fagot  nearer  so  that  the  beams  played  in  the  elephant's 
eyes  and  on  his  coat,  the  mahout  sat  down  and  was  still, 
lest  the  gods  observe  his  good  luck,  and  being  jealous,  turn 
it  into  evil. 


206    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

The  coat  was  not  pinkly  dark,  as  is  usual  in  baby  ele- 
phants. It  was  distinctly  light-colored, — only  a  few  de- 
grees darker  than  white. 

The  man  understood  at  once.  In  the  elephants,  as  well 
as  in  all  other  breeds,  an  albino  is  sometimes  born.  A  per- 
fectly white  elephant,  up  to  a  few  years  ago,  had  never  been 
seen,  but  on  rare  occasions  elephants  are  born  with  light- 
colored  or  clouded  hides.  Such  creatures  are  bought  at 
fabulous  prices  by  the  Malay  and  Siamese  princes,  to  whom 
a  white  elephant  is  the  greatest  treasure  that  a  king  can 
possess. 

Muztagh  was  a  long  way  from  being  an  albino,  yet  a 
tendency  in  that  direction  had  bleached  his  hide.  And  the 
man  knew  that  on  the  morrow  Dugan  Sahib  would  pay 
him  a  lifetime's  earnings  for  the  little  wabbly  calf,  whose 
welcome  had  been  the  wild  cries  of  the  tuskers  in  the  jungle. 

II 

Little  Muztagh  (which  means  White  Mountain  in  an 
ancient  tongue)  did  not  enjoy  his  babyhood  at  all.  He  was 
born  with  the  memory  of  jungle  kingdoms,  and  the  life  in 
the  elephant  lines  almost  killed  him  with  dullness. 

There  was  never  anything  to  do  but  nurse  of  the  strong 
elephant  milk  and  roam  about  in  the  keddah  or  along  the 
lines.  He  had  been  bought  the  second  day  of  his  life  by 
Dugan  Sahib,  and  the  great  white  heaven-born  saw  to  it 
that  he  underwent  none  of  the  risks  that  are  the  happy 
fate  of  most  baby  elephants.  His  mother  was  not  taken 
on  the  elephant  drives  into  the  jungles,  so  he  never  got  a 
taste  of  this  exciting  sport.  Mostly  she  was  kept  chained 
in  the  lines,  and  every  day  Langur  Dass,  the  low-caste  hill- 


The  Elephant  Remembers       207 

man  in  Dugan's  employ,  grubbed  grass  for  her  in  the  valleys. 
All  night  along,  except  the  regular  four  hours  of  sleep,  he 
would  hear  her  grumble  and  rumble  and  mutter  discontent 
that  her  little  son  shared  with  her. 

Muztagh's  second  year  was  little  better.  Of  course  he 
had  reached  the  age  where  he  could  eat  such  dainties  as 
grass  and  young  sugar  cane,  but  these  things  could  not  make 
up  for  the  fun  he  was  missing  in  the  hills.  He  would  stand 
long  hours  watching  their  purple  tops  against  the  skies,  and 
his  little  dark  eyes  would  glow.  He  would  see  the  storms 
break  and  flash  above  them,  behold  the  rains  lash  down 
through  the  jungles,  and  he  was  always  filled  with  strange 
longings  and  desires  that  he  was  too  young  to  understand 
or  to  follow.  He  would  see  the  white  haze  steam  up 
from  the  labyrinth  of  wet  vines,  and  he  would  tingle  and 
scratch  for  the  feel  of  its  wetness  on  his  skin.  And  often, 
when  the  mysterious  Burman  night  came  down,  it  seemed 
to  him  that  he  would  go  mad.  He  would  hear  the  wild 
tuskers  trumpeting  in  the  jungles  a  very  long  way  off,  and 
all  the  myriad  noises  of  the  mysterious  night,  and  at  such 
times  even  his  mother  looked  at  him  with  wonder. 

"Oh,  little  restless  one,"  Langur  Dass  would  say,  "thou 
and  that  old  cow  thy  mother  and  I  have  one  heart  between 
us.     We  know  the  burning — we  understand,  we  three!" 

It  was  true  that  Langur  Dass  understood  more  of  the 
ways  of  the  forest  people  than  any  other  hillman  in  the 
encampment.  But  his  caste  was  low,  and  he  was  drunken 
and  careless  and  lazy  beyond  words,  and  the  hunters  had 
mostly  only  scorn  for  him.  They  called  him  Langur  after 
a  gray-bearded  breed  of  monkeys  along  the  slopes  of  the 
Himalayas,  rather  suspecting  he  was  cursed  with  evil  spirits, 
for  why  should  any  sane  man  have  such  mad  ideas  as  to 


208    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

the  rights  of  elephants?  He  never  wanted  to  join  in  the 
drives, — which  was  a  strange  thing  indeed  for  a  man  raised 
in  the  hills.  Perhaps  he  was  afraid,  but  yet  they  could 
remember  a  certain  day  in  the  bamboo  thickets,  when  a 
great,  wild  buffalo  had  charged  their  camp,  and  Langur 
Dass  acted  as  if  fear  were  something  he  had  never  heard 
of  and  knew  nothing  whatever  about. 

One  day  they  asked  him  about  it.  "Tell  us,  Langur  Dass,'* 
they  asked,  mocking  the  ragged,  dejected-looking  creature, 
"if  thy  name  speaks  truth,  thou  art  brother  to  many  monkey- 
folk,  and  who  knows  the  jungle  better  than  thou  or  they? 
None  but  the  monkey-folk  and  thou  canst  talk  with  my 
lord  the  elephant.  Hen!  We  have  seen  thee  do  it,  Langur 
Dass.  How  is  it  that  when  we  go  hunting,  thou  art  afraid 
to  come  ?" 

Langur  looked  at  them  out  of  his  dull  eyes  and  evaded 
their  question  just  as  long  as  he  could.  "Have  you  for- 
gotten the  tales  you  heard  on  your  mothers'  breasts?"  he 
asked  at  last.  "Elephants  are  of  the  jungle.  You  are  of 
the  cooking  pots  and  thatch!  How  should  such  folk  as  ye 
are  understand?" 

This  was  flat  heresy  from  their  viewpoint.  There  is  an 
old  legend  among  the  elephant  catchers  to  the  effect  that  at 
one  time  men  were  subject  to  the  elephants. 

Yet  mostly  the  elephants  that  these  men  knew  were  pa- 
tient and  contented  in  their  bonds.  Mostly  they  loved  their 
mahouts,  gave  their  strong  backs  willingly  to  toil,  and  were 
always  glad  and  ready  to  join  in  the  chase  after  others 
of  their  breed.  Only  on  certain  nights  of  the  year,  when 
the  tuskers  called  from  the  jungles,  and  the  spirit  of  the 
wild  was  abroad,  would  their  love  of  liberty  return  to  them. 
But  to  all  this  little  Muztagh  was  distinctly  an  exception. 


The  Elephant  Remembers       209 

Even  though  he  had  been  born  in  captivity,  his  desire  for 
liberty  was  with  him  just  as  constantly  as  his  trunk  or  his 
ears. 

He  had  no  love  for  the  mahout  that  rode  his  mother. 
He  took  little  interest  in  the  little  brown  boys  and  girls 
that  played  before  his  stall.  He  would  stand  and  look 
over  their  heads  into  the  wild,  dark  heart  of  the  jungle 
that  no  man  can  ever  quite  understand.  And  being  only 
a  beast,  he  did  not  know  anything  about  the  caste  and  preju- 
dices of  the  men  he  saw,  but  he  did  know  that  one  of 
them,  the  low-caste  Langur  Dass,  ragged  and  dirty  and 
despised,  wakened  a  responsive  chord  in  his  lonely  heart. 

They  would  have  long  talks  together,  that  is,  Langur 
would  talk  and  Muztagh  would  mumble.  "Little  calf, 
little  fat  one,"  the  man  would  say,  "can  great  rocks  stop 
a  tree  from  growing?  Shall  iron  shackles  stop  a  prince  from 
being  king?  Muztagh — jewel  among  jewels!  Thy  heart 
speaks  through  those  sleepless  eyes  of  thine!  Have  patience 
— what  thou  knowest,  who  shall  take  away  from  thee?" 

But  most  of  the  mahouts  and  catchers  noticed  the  rapidity 
with  which  little  Muztagh  acquired  weight  and  strength. 
He  outweighed,  at  the  age  of  three,  any  calf  of  his  season 
in  the  encampment  by  a  full  two  hundred  pounds.  And  of 
course  three  in  an  elephant  is  no  older  than  three  in  a 
human  child.  He  was  still  just  a  baby,  even  if  he  did  have 
the  wild  tuskers'  love  of  liberty. 

"Shalt  thou  never  lie  the  day  long  in  the  cool  mud,  little 
one?  Never  see  a  storm  break  on  the  hills?  Nor  feel  a 
warm  rain  dripping  through  the  branches?  Or  are  these 
matters  part  of  thee  that  none  may  steal?"  Langur  Dass 
would  ask  him,  contented  to  wait  a  very  long  time  for  his 
answer.     "I  think  already  that  thou  knowest  how  the  tiger 


210    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

steals  away  at  thy  shrill  note;  how  thickets  feel  that  crash 
beneath  thy  hurrying  weight !  A  little  I  think  thou  knowest 
how  the  madness  comes  with  the  changing  seasons.  How 
knowest  thou  these  things?  Not  as  I  know  them,  who  have 
seen — nay,  but  as  a  king  knows  conquering;  it's  in  thy 
blood!  Is  a  bundle  of  sugar  cane  tribute  enough  for  thee, 
Kumiria?  Shall  purple  trappings  please  thee?  Shall  some 
fat  rajah  of  the  plains  make  a  beast  of  burden  of  thee? 
Answer,  lord  of  mighty  memories!" 

And  Muztagh  answered  in  his  own  way,  without  sound 
or  emphasis,  but  giving  his  love  to  Langur  Dass,  a  love  as 
large  as  the  big  elephant  heart  from  which  it  had  sprung. 
No  other  man  could  even  win  his  friendship.  The  smell 
of  the  jungle  was  on  Langur  Dass.  The  mahouts  and 
hunters  smelt  more  or  less  of  civilization  and  were  con- 
vinced for  their  part  that  the  disposition  of  the  little  light- 
colored  elephant  was  beyond  redemption. 

"He  is  a  born  rogue,"  was  their  verdict,  and  they  meant 
by  that  a  particular  kind  of  elephant,  sometimes  a  young 
male,  more  often  an  old  and  savage  tusker,  alone  in  the 
jungle — apart  from  the  herd.  Solitariness  doesn't  improve 
their  dispositions,  and  they  were  generally  expelled  from 
a  herd  for  ill  temper  to  begin  with.  "Woe  to  the  foolish 
prince  who  buys  this  one!"  said  the  graybeard  catchers. 
"There  is  murder  in  his  eyes." 

But  Langur  Dass  would  only  look  wise  when  he  heard 
these  remarks.  He  knew  elephants.  The  gleam  in  the  dark 
eyes  of  Muztagh  was  not  viciousness,  but  simply  inheritance, 
a  love  of  the  wide  wild  spaces  that  left  no  room  for  ordi- 
nary friendships. 

But  calf-love  and  mother-love  bind  other  animals  as  well 
as  men,  and  possibly  he  might  have  perfectly  fulfilled  the 


The  Elephant  Remembers       211 

plans  Dugan  had  made  for  him  but  for  a  mistake  the  sahib 
made  in  the  little  calf's  ninth  year. 

He  sold  Muztagh's  mother  to  an  elephant  breeder  from 
a  distant  province.  Little  Muztagh  saw  her  march  away 
between  two  tuskers,  down  the  long  elephant  trail  into  the 
valley  and  the  shadow. 

"Watch  the  little  one  closely  to-night,"  Dugan  Sahib  said 
to  his  mahout.  So  when  they  had  led  him  back  and  forth 
along  the  lines,  they  saw  that  the  ends  of  his  ropes  were 
pegged  down  tightly.  They  were  horsehair  ropes,  far  be- 
yond the  strength  of  any  normal  nine-year-old  elephant  to 
break.  Then  they  went  to  the  huts  and  to  their  women 
and  left  him  to  shift  restlessly  from  foot  to  foot,  and  think. 

Probably  he  would  have  been  satisfied  with  thinking, 
for  Muztagh  did  not  know  his  strength  and  thought  he 
was  securely  tied.  The  incident  that  upset  the  mahout's 
plans  was  simply  that  the  wild  elephants  trumpeted  again 
from  the  hills. 

Muztagh  heard  the  sound,  long-drawn  and  strange  from 
the  silence  of  the  jungle.  He  grew  motionless.  The  great 
ears  pricked  forward,  the  whipping  tail  stood  still.  It  was 
a  call  never  to  be  denied.  The  blood  was  leaping  in  his 
great  veins. 

He  suddenly  rocked  forward  with  all  his  strength.  The 
rope  spun  tight,  hummed,  and  snapped — very  softly  in- 
deed. Then  he  padded  in  silence  out  among  the  huts — a 
silence  that  was  all  the  more  marvelous  because  of  his  ton 
of  power. 

There  was  no  thick  jungle  here — just  soft  grass,  huts,  ap- 
proaching dark  fringe  that  was  the  jungle.  None  of  the 
mahouts  was  awake  to  see  him.     No  voice  called  him  back. 


212    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

The  grass  gave  way  to  bamboo  thickets,  the  smell  of  the 
huts  to  the  wild,  bewitching  perfumes  of  the  jungle. 

Then,  still  in  silence,  he  walked  forward  with  his  trunk 
outstretched  into  the  primordial  jungle  and  was  born  again. 


Ill 

Muztagh's  reception  was  cordial  from  the  very  first.  The 
great  bulls  of  the  herd  stood  still  and  lifted  their  ears 
when  they  heard  him  grunting  up  the  hill.  But  he  slipped 
among  them  and  was  forgotten  at  once.  They  had  no 
dealings  with  the  princes  of  Malay  and  Siam,  and  his  light- 
colored  coat  meant  nothing  whatever  to  them.  If  they  did 
any  thinking  about  him  at  all,  it  was  just  to  wonder 
why  a  calf  with  all  the  evident  marks  of  a  nine-year-old 
should  be  so  tall  and  weigh  so  much. 

One  can  fancy  that  the  great  old  wrinkled  tusker  that  led 
the  herd  peered  at  him  now  and  then  out  of  his  little  red 
eyes,  and  wondered.  A  herd  leader  begins  to  think  about 
future  contestants  for  his  place  as  soon  as  he  acquires  the 
leadership.  But  Hat!  This  little  one  would  not  have  his 
greatest  strength  for  fifteen  years. 

It  was  a  compact,  medium-sized  herd, — vast  males, 
mothers,  old-maid  elephants,  long-legged  and  ungainly, 
5'oung  males  just  learning  their  strength  and  proud  of  it 
beyond  words,  and  many  calves.  They  ranged  all  the  way 
in  size  from  the  great  leader,  who  stood  ten  feet  and  weighed 
nearly  nine  thousand  pounds,  to  little  two-hundred-and-fifty 
pound  babies  that  had  been  born  that  season.  And  before 
long  the  entire  herd  began  its  cautious  advance  into  the 
deeper  hills. 

The  first  night  in  the  jungle, — and  Muztagh  found  it 


The  Elephant  Remembers       213 

wonderful  past  all  dreams.  The  mist  on  his  skin  was  the 
same  cool  joy  he  had  expected.  There  were  sounds,  too, 
that  set  his  great  muscles  aquiver.  He  heard  the  sound 
that  the  bamboos  make — the  little  click-click  of  the  stems 
in  the  wind — the  soft  rustle  and  stir  of  many  leafy  tendrils 
entwining  and  touching  together,  and  the  whisper  of  the 
wind  over  the  jungle  grass.  And  he  knew,  because  it  was 
his  heritage,  what  every  single  one  of  these  sounds  meant. 

The  herd  threaded  through  the  dark  jungle  and  now 
they  descended  into  a  cool  river.  A  herd  of  deer — either 
the  dark  sambur  or  black  buck — sprang  from  the  misty  shore 
line  and  leaped  away  into  the  bamboos.  Farther  down,  he 
could  hear  the  grunt  of  buffalo. 

It  was  simply  a  caress, — the  touch  of  the  soft,  cool  water 
on  his  flanks.  Then  they  reared  out,  like  great  sea  gods 
rising  from  the  deep,  and  grunted  and  squealed  their  way 
up  the  banks  into  the  jungle  again. 

But  the  smells  were  the  book  that  he  read  best;  he  un- 
derstood them  even  better  than  the  sounds  of  green  things 
growing.  Flowers  that  he  could  not  see  hung  like  bells 
from  the  arching  branches.  Every  fern  and  every  seeding 
grass  had  its  own  scent  that  told  sweet  tales.  The  very 
mud  that  his  four  feet  sank  into  emitted  scent  that  told  the 
history  of  jungle  life  from  the  world's  beginnings.  When 
dawn  burst  over  the  eastern  hills,  he  was  weary  in  every 
muscle  of  his  young  body,  but  much  too  happy  to  admit  it. 

This  day  was  just  the  first  of  three  thousand  joyous 
days.  The  jungle,  old  as  the  world  itself,  is  ever  new.  Not 
even  the  wisest  elephant,  who,  after  all,  is  king  of  the  jungle, 
knows  what  will  turn  up  at  the  next  bend  in  the  elephant 
trail.  It  may  be  a  native  woodcutter,  whose  long  hair 
is  stirred  with  fright.     It  may  easily  be  one  of  the  great 


214     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

breed  of  bears,  large  as  the  American  grizzly,  that  some 
naturalists  believe  are  to  be  found  in  the  Siamese  and  Bur- 
man  jungles.  It  may  be  a  herd  of  wild  buffalo,  always  look- 
ing for  a  fight,  or  simply  some  absurd  armadillo-like  thing, 
to  make  him  shake  his  vast  sides  with  mirth. 

The  herd  was  never  still.  They  ranged  from  one  mys- 
terious hill  to  another,  to  the  ranges  of  the  Himalayas  and 
back  again.  There  were  no  rivers  that  they  did  not  swim, 
no  jungles  that  they  did  not  penetrate,  no  elephant  trails 
that  they  did  not  follow,  in  the  whole  northeastern  cor- 
ner of  British  India.  And  all  the  time  Muztagh's  strength 
grew  upon  him  until  it  became  too  vast  a  thing  to  measure 
or  control. 

Whether  or  not  he  kept  with  the  herd  was  by  now  a 
matter  of  supreme  indifference  to  him.  He  no  longer  needed 
its  protection.  Except  for  the  men  who  came  with  ropes 
and  guns  and  shoutings,  there  was  nothing  in  the  jungle 
for  him  to  fear.  He  was  twenty  years  old,  and  he  stood 
nearly  eleven  feet  to  the  top  of  his  shoulders.  He  would 
have  broken  any  scales  in  the  Indian  Empire  that  tried 
to  weigh  him. 

He  had  had  his  share  of  adventures,  yet  he  knew  that  life 
in  reality  had  just  begun.  The  time  would  come  when  he 
would  want  to  fight  the  great  arrogant  bull  for  the  leader- 
ship of  the  herd.  He  was  tired  of  fighting  the  young 
bulls  of  his  own  age.  He  always  won,  and  to  an  elephant 
constant  winning  is  almost  as  dull  as  constant  losing.  He 
was  a  great  deal  like  a  youth  of  twenty  in  any  breed  of 
any  land, — light-hearted,  self-confident,  enjoying  every  min- 
ute of  wakefulness  between  one  midnight  and  another.  He 
loved  the  jungle  smells  and  the  jungle  sounds,  and  he  could 


The  Elephant  Remembers      215 

even  tolerate  the  horrible  laughter  of  the  hyenas  that  some- 
times tore  to  shreds  the  silence  of  the  grassy  plains  below. 

But  India  is  too  thickly  populated  by  human  beings 
for  a  wild  elephant  to  escape  observation  entirely.  Many 
natives  had  caught  sight  of  him,  and  at  last  the  tales  reached 
a  little  circle  of  trackers  and  hunters  in  camp  on  a  dis- 
tant range  of  hills.  They  did  not  work  for  Dugan  Sahib, 
for  Dugan  Sahib  was  dead  long  since.  They  were  a  de- 
termined little  group,  and  one  night  they  sat  and  talked 
softly  over  their  fire.  If  Muztagh's  ears  had  been  sharp 
enough  to  hear  their  words  across  the  space  of  hills,  he 
wouldn't  have  gone  to  his  mud  baths  with  such  complacency 
the  next  day.  But  the  space  between  them  was  fifty  miles 
of  sweating  jungle,  and  of  course  he  did  not  hear. 

"You  will  go,  Khusru,"  said  the  leader,  "for  there  are 
none  here  half  so  skilful  with  horsehair  rope  as  you.  If 
you  do  not  come  back  within  twelve  months,  we  shall  know 
you  have  failed." 

Of  course  all  of  them  knew  what  he  meant.  If  a  man 
failed  in  the  effort  to  capture  a  wild  elephant  by  the  hair- 
rope  method,  he  very  rarely  lived  to  tell  of  it. 

"In  that  case,"  Ahmad  Din  went  on,  "there  will  be 
a  great  drive  after  the  monsoon  of  next  year.  Picked  men 
will  be  chosen.  No  detail  will  be  overlooked.  It  will  cost 
more,  but  it  will  be  sure.  And  our  purses  will  be  fat  from 
the  selling  price  of  this  king  of  elephants  with  a  white 
coat  I" 

IV 

There  is  no  need  to  follow  Khusru  on  his  long  pursuit 
through  the  elephant  trails.  He  was  an  able  hunter  and, 
after  the  manner  of  the  elephant  trackers,  the  scarred  little 


216    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

man  followed  Muztagh  through  jungle  and  river,  over  hill 
and  into  dale,  for  countless  days,  and  at  last,  as  Muztagh 
slept,  he  crept  up  within  a  half-dozen  feet  of  him.  He  in- 
tended to  loop  a  horsehair  rope  about  his  great  feet — one 
of  the  oldest  and  most  hazardous  methods  of  elephant-catch- 
ing.    But  Muztagh  wakened  just  in  time. 

And  then  a  curious  thing  happened.  The  native  could 
never  entirely  believe  it,  and  it  was  one  of  his  best  stories 
to  the  day  he  died.  Any  other  wild  tusker  would  have 
charged  in  furious  wrath,  and  there  would  have  been  a 
quick  and  certain  death  beneath  his  great  knees.  Muztagh 
started  out  as  if  he  had  intended  to  charge.  He  lifted  his 
trunk  out  of  the  way — the  elephant  trunk  is  for  a  thou- 
sand uses,  but  fighting  is  not  one  of  them — and  sprang  for- 
ward. He  went  just  two  paces.  Then  his  little  eyes  caught 
sight  of  the  brown  figure  fleeing  through  the  bamboos. 
And  at  once  the  elephant  set  his  great  feet  to  brake  him- 
self, and  drew  to  a  sliding  halt  six  feet  beyond. 

He  did  not  know  why.  He  was  perfectly  aware  that  this 
man  was  an  enemy,  jealous  of  his  most-loved  liberty.  He 
knew  perfectly  it  was  the  man's  intention  to  put  him  back 
into  his  bonds.  He  did  not  feel  fear,  either,  because  an 
elephant's  anger  is  too  tremendous  an  emotion  to  leave 
room  for  any  other  impulse  such  as  fear.  It  seemed  to  him 
that  memories  came  thronging  from  long  ago,  so  real  and 
insistent  that  he  could  not  think  of  charging. 

He  remembered  his  days  in  the  elephant  lines.  These 
brown  creatures  had  been  his  masters  then.  They  had  cut 
his  grass  for  him  in  the  jungle,  and  brought  him  bundles 
of  sugar  cane.  The  hill  people  say  that  the  elephant  mem- 
ory is  the  greatest  single  marvel  in  the  jungle,  and  it  was 
that  memory  that  saved  Khusru  then.    It  wasn't  deliberate 


The  Elephant  Remembers       217 

gratitude  for  the  grass  cutting  of  long  ago.  It  wasn't  any 
particular  emotion  that  he  could  reach  out  his  trunk  and 
touch.  It  was  simply  an  impulse, — another  one  of  the 
thousand  mysteries  that  envelop,  like  a  cloud,  the  mental 
processes  of  these  largest  of  forest  creatures. 

These  were  the  days  when  he  lived  apart  from  the  herd. 
He  did  it  from  choice.  He  liked  the  silence,  the  solitary 
mud  baths,  the  constant  watchfulness  against  danger. 

One  day  a  rhino  charged  him,  without  warning  or  rea- 
son. This  is  quite  a  common  thing  for  a  rhino  to  do.  They 
have  the  worst  tempers  in  the  jungle,  and  they  would 
just  as  soon  charge  a  mountain  if  they  didn't  like  the  look 
of  it.  Muztagh  had  awakened  the  great  creature  from  his 
sleep,  and  he  came  bearing  down  like  a  tank  over  "no 
man's  land." 

Muztagh  met  him  squarely,  with  the  full  shock  of  his 
tusks,  and  the  battle  ended  promptly.  Muztagh's  tusk, 
driven  by  five  tons  of  might  behind  it,  would  have  pierced 
a  ship's  side,  and  the  rhino  limped  away  to  let  his  hurt 
grow  well  and  meditate  revenge.  Thereafter,  for  a  full 
year,  he  looked  carefully  out  of  his  bleary,  drunken  eyes 
and  chose  a  smaller  objective  before  he  charged. 

Month  after  month  Muztagh  wended  along  through  the 
elephant  trails,  and  now  and  then  rooted  up  great  trees  just 
to  try  his  strength.  Sometimes  he  went  silently,  and  some- 
times like  an  avalanche.  He  swam  alone  in  the  deep 
holes,  and  sometimes  shut  his  eyes  and  stood  on  the  bottom, 
just  keeping  the  end  of  his  trunk  out  of  the  water.  One  day 
he  was  obliged  to  kneel  on  the  broad  back  of  an  alligator 
who  tried  to  bite  off  his  foot.  He  drove  the  long  body  down 
into  the  muddy  bottom,  and  no  living  creature,  except  pos- 
sibly the  catfish  that  burrow  in  the  mud,  ever  saw  it  again. 


218     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

He  loved  the  rains  that  flashed  through  the  jungles,  the 
swift-climbing  dawns  in  the  east,  the  strange,  tense,  breath- 
less nights.  And  at  midnight  he  loved  to  trumpet  to  the 
herd  on  some  far-away  hill,  and  hear,  fainter  than  the  death 
cry  of  a  beetle,  its  answer  come  back  to  him.  At  twenty- 
five  he  had  reached  full  maturity;  and  no  more  magnificent 
specimen  of  the  elephant  could  be  found  in  all  of  British 
India.    At  last  he  had  begun  to  learn  his  strength. 

Of  course  he  had  known  for  years  his  mastery  over  the 
inanimate  things  of  the  world.  He  knew  how  easy  it  was  to 
tear  a  tree  from  its  roots,  to  jerk  a  great  tree  limb  from 
its  socket.  He  knew  that  under  most  conditions  he  had 
nothing  to  fear  from  the  great  tigers,  although  a  fight 
with  a  tiger  is  a  painful  thing  and  well  to  avoid.  But  he 
did  not  know  that  he  had  developed  a  craft  and  skill  that 
would  avail  him  in  battle  against  the  greatest  of  his  own  kind. 
He  made  the  discovery  one  sunlit  day  beside  the  Manipur 
River. 

He  was  in  the  mud  bath,  grunting  and  bubbling  with 
content.  It  was  a  bath  with  just  room  enough  for  one. 
And  seeing  that  he  was  young,  and  perhaps  failing  to  meas- 
ure his  size,  obscured  as  it  was  in  the  mud,  a  great  "rogue" 
bull  came  out  of  the  jungles  to  take  the  bath  for  himself. 

He  was  a  huge  creature,  wrinkled  and  yellow-tusked  and 
scarred  from  the  wounds  of  a  thousand  fights.  His  little 
red  eyes  looked  out  malignantly,  and  he  grunted  all  the 
insults  the  elephant  tongue  can  compass  to  the  youngster 
that  lolled  in  the  bath.  He  confidently  expected  that  Muz- 
tagh  would  yield  at  once,  because  as  a  rule  young  twenty- 
five-year-olds  do  not  care  to  mix  in  battle  with  the  scarred 
and  crafty  veterans  of  sixty  years.  But  he  did  not  know 
Muztagh. 


The  Elephant  Remembers       219 

The  latter  had  been  enjoying  the  bath  to  the  limit,  and 
he  had  no  desire  whatever  to  give  it  up.  Something  hot 
and  raging  seemed  to  explode  in  his  brain  and  it  was 
as  if  a  red  glare,  such  as  sometimes  comes  in  the  sunset, 
had  fallen  over  all  the  stretch  of  river  and  jungle  before 
his  eyes.  He  squealed  once,  reared  up  with  one  lunge  out 
of  the  bath — and  charged.    They  met  with  a  shock. 

Of  all  the  expressions  of  power  in  the  animal  world, 
the  elephant  fight  is  the  most  terrible  to  see.  It  is  as  if 
two  mountains  rose  up  from  their  roots  of  strata  and  went 
to  war.  It  is  terrible  to  hear,  too.  The  jungle  had  been 
still  before.  The  river  glided  softly,  the  wind  was  dead, 
the  mid-afternoon  silence  was  over  the  thickets. 

The  jungle  people  were  asleep.  A  thunder  storm  would 
not  have  broken  more  quickly,  or  could  not  have  created  a 
wilder  pandemonium.  The  jungle  seemed  to  shiver  with 
the  sound. 

They  squealed  and  bellowed  and  trumpeted  and  grunted 
and  charged.  Their  tusks  clicked  like  the  noise  of  a  giant's 
game  of  billiards.  The  thickets  cracked  and  broke  beneath 
their  great   feet. 

It  lasted  only  a  moment.  It  was  so  easy,  after  all.  In 
a  very  few  seconds  indeed,  the  old  rogue  became  aware 
that  he  had  made  a  very  dangerous  and  disagreeable  mis- 
take.    There  were  better  mud  baths  on  the  river,  anyway. 

He  had  not  been  able  to  land  a  single  blow.  And  his 
wrath  gave  way  to  startled  amazement  when  Muztagh  sent 
home  his  third.     The  rogue  did  not  wait  for  the  fourth. 

Muztagh  chased  him  into  the  thickets.  But  he  was  too 
proud  to  chase  a  beaten  elephant  for  long.  He  halted, 
trumpeting,  and  swung  back  to  his  mud  bath. 

But  he  did  not  enter  the  mud  again.     All  at  once  he 


220     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

remembered  the  herd  and  the  fights  of  his  calfhood.  All 
at  once  he  knew  that  his  craft  and  strength  and  power  were 
beyond  that  of  any  elephant  in  all  the  jungle.  Who  was 
the  great,  arrogant  herd  leader  to  stand  against  him  ?  What 
yellow  tusks  were  to  meet  his  and  come  away  unbroken? 

His  little  eyes  grew  ever  more  red  as  he  stood  rocking 
back  and  forth,  his  trunk  lifted  to  catch  the  sounds  and 
smells  of  the  distant  jungle.  Why  should  he  abide  alone, 
when  he  could  be  the  ruler  of  the  herd  and  the  jungle  king? 
Then  he  grunted  softly  and  started  away  down  the  river. 
Far  away,  beyond  the  mountains  and  rivers  and  the  villages 
of  the  hillfolk,  the  herd  of  his  youth  roamed  in  joyous 
freedom.     He  would  find  them  and  assert  his  mastery. 


The  night  fire  of  a  little  band  of  elephant  catchers 
burned  fitfully  at  the  edge  of  the  jungle.  They  were  silent 
men — for  they  had  lived  long  on  the  elephant  trails — and 
curiously  scarred  and  somber.  They  smoked  their  cheroots, 
and  waited  for  Ahmad  Din  to  speak. 

"You  have  all  heard?"  he  asked  at  last. 

All  but  one  of  them  nodded.  Of  course  this  did  not 
count  the  most  despised  one  of  them  all — old  Langur  Dass 
— who  sat  at  the  very  edge  of  the  shadow.  His  long  hair 
was  gray,  and  his  youth  had  gone  where  the  sun  goes  at 
evening.  They  scarcely  addressed  a  word  to  him,  or  he  to 
them.  True,  he  knew  the  elephants,  but  was  he  not  pos- 
sessed of  evil  spirits?  He  was  always  without  rupees, 
too,  a  creature  of  the  wild  that  could  not  seem  to  under- 
stand the  gathering  of  money.  As  a  man,  according  to  the 
standards  of  men,  he  was  an  abject  failure. 


The  Elephant  Remembers       221 

"Khusru  has  failed  to  catch  White-Skin,  but  he  has  lived 
to  tell  many  lies  about  it.    He  comes  to-night." 

It  was  noticeable  that  Langur  Dass,  at  the  edge  of  the 
circle,  pricked  up  his  ears. 

"Do  you  mean  the  white  elephant  of  which  the  Manipur 
people  tell  so  many  lies?"  he  asked.  "Do  you,  skilled 
catchers  that  you  are,  believe  that  such  an  elephant  is  still 
wild  in  the  jungle?" 

Ahmad  Din  scowled.  "The  Manipur  people  tell  of  him, 
but  for  once  they  tell  the  truth,"  was  the  reply.  "He  is  the 
greatest  elephant,  the  richest  prize,  in  all  of  Burma.  Too 
many  people  have  seen  him  to  doubt.  I  add  my  word  to 
theirs,  thou  son  of  immorality!" 

Ahmad  Din  hesitated  a  moment  before  he  continued.  Per- 
haps it  was  a  mistake  to  tell  of  the  great,  light-colored  ele- 
phant until  this  man  should  have  gone  away.  But  what 
harm  could  this  wanderer  do  them?  All  men  knew  that 
the  jungle  had  maddened  him. 

Langur  Dass's  face  lit  suddenly.  "Then  it  could  be 
none  but  Muztagh,  escaped  from  Dugan  Sahib  fifteen  years 
ago.  That  calf  was  also  white.  He  was  also  overgrown 
for  his  years." 

One  of  the  trackers  suddenly  gasped.  "Then  that  is 
why  he  spared  Khusru!"  he  cried.     "He  remembered  men." 

The  others  nodded  gravely.  "They  never  forget,"  said 
Langur  Dass. 

"You  will  be  silent  while  I  speak,"  Ahmad  Din  went  on. 
Langur  grew  silent  as  commanded,  but  his  thoughts  were 
flowing  backward  twenty  years,  to  days  at  the  elephant  lines 
in  distant  hills.  Muztagh  was  the  one  living  creature  that 
in  all  his  days  had  loved  Langur  Dass.  The  man  shut  his 
eyes,  and  his  limbs  seemed  to  relax  as  if  he  had  lost  all 


222     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

interest  in  the  talk.  The  evil  one  took  hold  of  him  at  such 
times,  the  people  said,  and  his  thoughts  fled  back  into  the 
purple  hills  and  the  far-off  spaces  of  the  jungle.  But  to- 
night he  was  only  pretending.  He  meant  to  hear  every 
word  of  the  talk  before  he  left  the  circle. 

"He  tells  a  mad  story,  as  you  know,  of  the  elephant 
sparing  him  when  he  was  beneath  his  feet,"  Ahmad  Din 
went  on;  "that  part  of  his  story  does  not  matter  to  us. 
Hail  He  might  have  been  frightened  enough  to  say  that 
the  sun  set  at  noon.  But  what  matters  to  us  more  is  that 
he  knows  where  the  herd  is — but  a  day's  journey  beyond  the 
river.    And  there  is  no  time  to  be  lost." 

His  fellows  nodded  in  agreement. 

"So  to-morrow  we  will  break  camp.  There  can  be  no 
mistake  this  time.  There  must  be  no  points  overlooked.  The 
chase  will  cost  much,  but  it  will  return  a  hundred-fold. 
Khusru  says  that  at  last  the  white  one  has  started  back  to- 
ward his  herd,  so  that  all  can  be  taken  in  the  same  keddah. 
And  the  white  sahib  that  holds  the  license  is  not  to  know 
that  White-Coat  i9  in  the  herd  at  all." 

The  circle  nodded  again,  and  contracted  toward  the 
speaker. 

"We  will  hire  beaters  and  drivers,  the  best  that  can  be 
found.     To-morrow  we  will  take  the  elephants  and  go." 

Langur  Dass  pretended  to  waken.  "I  have  gone  hungry 
many  days,"  he  said.  "If  the  drive  is  on,  perhaps  you 
will  give  your  servant  a  place  among  the  beaters." 

The  circle  turned  and  stared  at  him.  It  was  one  of 
the  stories  of  Langur  Dass  that  he  never  partook  in  the 
elephant  hunts.  Evidently  poor  living  had  broken  his  reso- 
lutions. 

"You  shall  have  your  wish,  if  you  know  how  to  keep  a 


The  Elephant  Remembers      223 

closed  mouth,"  Ahmad  Din  replied.  "There  are  other  hunt- 
ing parties  in  the  hills." 

Langur  nodded.  He  was  very  adept  indeed  at  keeping 
a  closed  mouth.     It  is  one  of  the  first  lessons  of  the  jungle. 

For  another  long  hour  they  sat  and  perfected  their  plans. 
Then  they  lay  down  by  the  fire  together,  and  sleep  dropped 
over  them  one  by  one.    At  last  Langur  sat  by  the  fire  alone. 

"You  will  watch  the  flame  to-night,"  Ahmad  Din  ordered. 
"We  did  not  feed  you  to-night  for  pity  on  your  gray  hairs. 
And  remember — a  gipsy  died  in  a  tiger's  claws  on  this  very 
slope — not  six  months  past." 

Langur  Dass  was  left  alone  with  his  thoughts.  Soon  he 
got  up,  and  stole  out  into  the  velvet  darkness.  The  mists 
were  over  the  hills  as  always. 

"Have  I  followed  the  tales  of  your  greatness  all  these 
years  for  this?"  he  muttered.  "It  is  right  for  pigs  with 
the  hearts  of  pigs  to  break  their  backs  in  labor.  But  you, 
my  Muztagh !  Jewel  among  elephants !  King  of  the  jungle ! 
Thou  art  of  the  true  breed!  Moreover,  I  am  minded  that 
thy  heart  and  mine  are  one! 

"Thou  art  born  ten  thousand  years  after  thy  time,  Muz- 
tagh," he  went  on.  "Thou  art  of  the  breed  of  masters, 
not  of  slaves !  We  are  of  the  same  womb,  thou  and  I.  Can 
I  not  understand?  These  are  not  my  people — these  brown 
men  about  the  fire.  I  have  not  thy  strength,  Muztagh, 
or  I  would  be  out  there  with  thee!  Yet  is  not  the  saying 
that  brother  shall  serve  brother?" 

He  turned  slowly  back  to  the  circle  of  the  firelight.  Then 
his  brown,  scrawny  fingers  clenched. 

"Am  I  to  desert  my  brother  in  his  hour  of  need?  Am  I 
to  see  these  brown  pigs  put  chains  around  him,  in  the  mo- 
ment of  his  power?    A  king,  falling  to  the  place  of  a  slave? 


224     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

Muztagh,  we  will  see  what  can  be  done!  Muztagh,  my 
king,  my  pearl,  my  pink  baby,  for  whom  I  dug  grass  in 
the  long  ago!  Thy  Langur  Dass  is  old,  and  his  whole 
strength  is  not  that  of  thy  trunk,  and  men  look  at  him  as  a 
worm  in  the  grass.  But  hail  perhaps  thou  wilt  find  him  an 
ally  not  to  be  despised!" 

VI 

The  night  had  just  fallen,  moist  and  heavy  over  the  jungle, 
when  Muztagh  caught  up  with  his  herd.  He  found  them 
in  an  open  grassy  glade,  encircled  by  hills,  and  they  were 
all  waiting,  silent,  as  he  sped  down  the  hills  toward  them. 
They  had  heard  him  coming  a  long  way.  He  was  not 
attempting  silence.  The  jungle  people  had  got  out  of  his 
way. 

The  old  bull  that  led  the  herd,  seventy  years  of  age  and 
at  the  pride  of  his  wisdom  and  strength,  scarred,  yellow- 
tusked  and  noble  past  any  elephant  patriarch  in  the  jungle, 
curled  up  his  trunk  when  he  saw  him  come.  He  knew  very 
well  what  would  happen.  And  because  no  one  knows  better 
than  the  jungle  people  what  a  good  thing  it  is  to  take  the 
offensive  in  all  battles,  and  because  it  was  fitting  his  place 
and  dignity,  he  uttered  the  challenge  himself. 

The  silence  dropped  as  something  from  the  sky.  The  little 
pink  calves  who  had  never  seen  the  herd  grow  still  in  this 
same  way  before  felt  the  dawn  of  the  storm  that  they 
could  not  understand,  and  took  shelter  beneath  their  mothers' 
bellies.  But  they  did  not  squeal.  The  silence  was  too  deep 
for  them  to  dare  to  break. 

It  is  always  an  epoch  in  the  life  of  the  herd  when  a  young 
bull  contests  for  leadership.  It  is  a  much  more  serious 
thing  than  in  the  herds  of  deer  and  buffalo.     The  latter 


The  Elephant  Remembers      225 

only  live  a  handful  of  years,  then  grow  weak  and  die.  A 
great  bull  who  has  attained  strength  and  wisdom  enough  to 
obtain  the  leadership  of  an  elephant  herd  may  often  keep 
it  for  forty  years.  Kings  do  not  rise  and  fall  half  so  often 
as  in  the  kingdoms  of  Europe.  For,  as  most  men  know,  an 
elephant  is  not  really  old  until  he  has  seen  a  hundred  sum* 
mers  come  and  go.  Then  he  will  linger  fifty  years  more, 
wise  and  gray  and  wrinkled  and  strange  and  full  of  mem- 
ories of  a  time  no  man  can  possibly  remember. 

Long  years  had  passed  since  the  leader's  place  had  been 
questioned.  The  aristocracy  of  strength  is  drawn  on  -quite 
inflexible  lines.  It  would  have  been  simply  absurd  for  an 
elephant  of  the  Dwasila  or  Mierga  grades  to  covet  the  lead- 
ership. They  had  grown  old  without  making  the  attempt. 
Only  the  great  Kumiria,  the  grand  dukes  in  the  aristocracy, 
had  ever  made  the  trial  at  all.  And  besides,  the  bull  was  a 
better  fighter  after  thirty  years  of  leadership  than  on  the 
day  he  had  gained  the  honor. 

The  herd  stood  like  heroic  figures  in  stone  for  a  long  mo- 
ment,— until  Muztagh  had  replied  to  the  challenge.  He 
was  so  surprised  that  he  couldn't  make  any  sound  at  all  at 
first.  He  had  expected  to  do  the  challenging  himself.  The 
fact  that  the  leader  had  done  it  shook  his  self-confidence 
to  some  slight  degree.  Evidently  the  older  leader  still  felt 
able  to  handle  any  young  and  arrogant  bulls  that  desired 
his  place. 

Then  the  herd  began  to  shift.  The  cows  drew  back  with 
their  calves,  the  bulls  surged  forward,  and  slowly  they  made 
a  hollow  ring,  not  greatly  different  from  the  pugilistic 
ring  known  to  fight-fans.  The  calves  began  to  squeal,  but 
their  mothers  silenced  them.  Very  slowly  and  grandly,  with 
infinite   dignity,    Muztagh   stamped   into   the   circle.      His 


226    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

tusks  gleamed.  His  eyes  glowed  red.  And  those  appraising 
old  bulls  in  the  ring  knew  that  such  an  elephant  had  not 
been  born  since  the  time  of  their  grandfathers. 

They  looked  him  over  from  tail  to  trunk.  They  marked 
the  symmetrical  form,  the  legs  like  mighty  pillars,  the  sloping 
back,  the  wide-apart,  intelligent  eyes.  His  shoulders  were 
an  expression  of  latent  might, — powrer  to  break  a  tree-trunk 
at  its  base;  by  the  conformity  of  his  muscles  he  was  agile 
and  quick  as  a  tiger.  And  knowing  these  things,  and  rec- 
ognizing them,  and  honoring  them,  devotees  of  strength 
that  they  were,  they  threw  their  trunks  in  the  air  till  they 
touched  their  foreheads  and  blared  their  full-voiced  salute. 

They  gave  it  the  same  instant,  as  musicians  strike  the  same 
note  at  their  leader's  signal.  It  was  a  perfect  explosion 
of  sound,  a  terrible  blare,  that  crashed  out  through  the 
jungles  and  wakened  every  sleeping  thing.  The  dew  fell 
from  the  trees.  A  great  tawny  tiger,  lingering  in  hope 
of  an  elephant  calf,  slipped  silently  away.  The  sound 
rang  true  and  loud  to  the  surrounding  hills  and  echoed  and 
reechoed  softer  and  softer,  until  it  was  just  a  tiny  tremor 
in  the  air. 

Not  only  the  jungle  folk  marveled  at  the  sound.  At  an 
encampment  three  miles  distant  Ahmad  Din  and  his  men 
heard  the  wild  call  and  looked  with  wondering  eyes  upon 
each  other.    Then  out  of  the  silence  spoke  Langur  Dass. 

"My  lord  Muztagh  has  come  back  to  his  herd — that  is 
his  salute,"  he  said. 

Ahmad  Din  looked  darkly  about  the  circle.  "And  how 
long  shall  he  stay?"  he  asked. 

The  trap  was  almost  ready.  The  hour  to  strike  had 
almost  come. 

Meanwhile  the  grand  old  leader  stamped  into  the  circle, 


The  Elephant  Remembers      227 

seeming  unconscious  of  the  eyes  upon  him,  battle-scarred 
and  old.  Even  if  this  fight  were  his  last,  he  meant  to  pre- 
serve his  dignity. 

Again  the  salute  sounded,  shattering  out  like  a  thunder- 
clap over  the  jungle.    Then  challenger  and  challenged  closed. 

At  first  the  watchers  were  silent.  Then  as  the  battle 
grew  ever  fiercer  and  more  terrible,  they  began  to  grunt  and 
squeal,  surging  back  and  forth,  stamping  the  earth  and 
crashing  the  underbrush.  All  the  jungle  folk  for  miles 
about  knew  what  was  occurring.  And  Ahmad  Din  wished 
his  keddah  were  completed,  for  never  could  there  be  a  better 
opportunity  to  surround  the  herd  than  at  the  present  moment, 
when  they  had  forgotten  all  things  except  the  battling  mon- 
sters in  the  center  of  the  ring. 

The  two  bulls  were  quite  evenly  matched.  The  patriarch 
knew  more  of  fighting,  had  learned  more  wiles,  but  he  had 
neither  the  strength  nor  the  agility  of  Muztagh.  The  late 
twilight  deepened  into  the  intense  dark,  and  the  stars  of 
midnight  rose  above  the  eastern  hills. 

All  at  once,  Muztagh  went  to  his  knees.  But  as  might 
a  tiger,  he  sprang  aside  in  time  to  avoid  a  terrible  tusk  blow 
to  his  shoulder.  And  his  counter-blow,  a  lashing  cut  with 
the  head,  shattered  the  great  leader  to  the  earth.  The  ele- 
phants bounded  forward,  but  the  old  leader  had  a  trick 
left  in  his  trunk.  As  Muztagh  bore  down  upon  him  he 
reared  up  beneath,  and  almost  turned  the  tables.  Only  the 
youngster's  superior  strength  saved  him  from  immediate  de- 
feat. 

But  as  the  night  drew  to  morning,  the  bulls  began  to  see 
that  the  tide  of  the  battle  had  turned.  Youth  was  con- 
quering,— too  mighty  and  agile  to  resist.  The  rushes  of 
the  patriarch  were  ever  weaker.     He  still  could  inflict  pun- 


228    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

ishment,  and  the  hides  of  both  of  them  were  terrible  to  see, 
but  he  was  no  longer  able  to  take  advantage  of  his  open- 
ings. Then  Muztagh  did  a  thing  that  reassured  the  old 
bulls  as  to  his  craft  and  wisdom.  Just  as  a  pugilist  will 
invite  a  blow  to  draw  his  opponent  within  range,  Muz- 
tagh pretended  to  leave  his  great  shoulder  exposed.  The 
old  bull  failed  to  see  the  plot.  He  bore  down,  and  Muztagh 
was  ready  with  flashing  tusk. 

What  happened  thereafter  occurred  too  quickly  for  the 
eyes  of  the  elephants  to  follow.  They  saw  the  great  bull 
go  down  and  Muztagh  stand  lunging  above  him.  And 
the  battle  was  over. 

The  great  leader,  seriously  hurt,  backed  away  into  the 
shadowed  jungle.  His  trunk  was  lowered  in  token  of  de- 
feat. Then  the  ring  was  empty  except  for  a  great  red- 
eyed  elephant,  whose  hide  was  no  longer  white,  standing 
blaring  his  triumph  to  the  stars. 

Three  times  the  elephant  salute  crashed  out  into  the  jungle 
silence, — the  full-voiced  salaam  to  a  new  king.  Muztagh 
had  come  into  his  birthright. 

VII 

The  keddah  was  built  at  last.  It  was  a  strong  stockade, 
opening  with  great  wings  spreading  out  one  hundred  yards, 
and  equipped  with  the  great  gate  that  lowered  like  a 
portcullis  at  the  funnel  end  of  the  wings.  The  herd  had 
been  surrounded  by  the  drivers  and  beaters,  and  slowly  they 
had  been  driven,  for  long  days,  toward  the  keddah  mouth. 
They  had  guns  loaded  with  blank  cartridges,  and  firebrands 
ready  to  light.  At  a  given  signal  they  would  close  down 
quickly  about  the  herd,  and  stampede  it  into  the  yawning 
mouth  of  the  stockade. 


The  Elephant  Remembers      229 

No  detail  had  been  overlooked.  No  expense  had  been 
spared.  The  profit  was  assured  in  advance,  not  only  from 
the  matchless  Muztagh,  but  from  the  herd  as  well.  The 
king  of  the  jungle,  free  now  as  the  winds  or  the  waters, 
was  about  to  go  back  to  his  chains.  These  had  been  such 
days!  He  had  led  the  herd  through  the  hills,  and  had 
known  the  rapture  of  living  as  never  before.  It  had  been 
his  work  to  clear  the  trail  of  all  dangers  for  the  herd.  It 
was  his  pride  to  find  them  the  coolest  watering-places,  the 
greenest  hills.  One  night  a  tiger  had  tried  to  kill  a  calf 
that  had  wandered  from  its  mother's  side.  Muztagh  lifted 
his  trunk  high  and  charged  down  with  great,  driving  strides, 
— four  tons  and  over  of  majestic  wrath.  The  tiger  leaped  to 
meet  him,  but  the  elephant  was  ready.  He  had  met  tigers 
before.  He  avoided  the  terrible  stroke  of  outstretched 
claws,  and  his  tusks  lashed  to  one  side  as  the  tiger  was  in 
midspring.  Then  he  lunged  out,  and  the  great  knees  de- 
scended slowly,  as  a  hydraulic  press  descends  on  yellow 
apples.  And  soon  after  that  the  kites  were  dropping  out 
of  the  sky  for  a  feast. 

His  word  was  law  in  the  herd.  And  slowly  he  began 
to  overcome  the  doubt  that  the  great  bulls  had  of  him, — 
doubt  of  his  youth  and  experience.  If  he  had  had  three 
months  more  of  leadership,  their  trust  would  have  been  ab- 
solute. But  in  the  meantime,  the  slow  herding  toward  the 
keddah  had  begun. 

"We  will  need  brave  men  to  stand  at  the  end  of  the 
wings  of  the  keddah"  said  Ahmad  Din.  He  spoke  no 
less  than  truth.  The  man  who  stands  at  the  end  of  the 
wings,  or  wide-stretching  gates,  of  the  keddah  is  of  course 
in  the  greatest  danger  of  being  charged  and  killed.  The 
herd,  mad  with  fright,  is  only  slightly  less  afraid  of  the 


230    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

spreading  wings  of  the  stockade  than  of  the  yelling,  whoop- 
ing beaters  behind.  Often  they  will  try  to  break  through 
the  circle  rather  than  enter  the  wings. 

"For  two  rupees  additional  I  will  hold  one  of  the  wings," 
replied  old  Langur  Dass.  Ahmad  Din  glanced  at  him, — at 
his  hard,  bright  eyes  and  determined  face.  Then  he  peered 
hard  and  tried  in  vain  to  read  the  thoughts  behind  the  eyes. 
"You  are  a  madman,  Langur  Dass,"  he  said  wonderingly. 
"But  thou  shalt  lie  behind  the  right-wing  men  to  pass  them 
torches.     I  have  spoken." 

"And  the  two  extra  rupees?"  Langur  asked  cunningly. 

"Maybe."  One  does  not  throw  away  rupees  in  Upper 
Burma. 

Within  the  hour  the  signal  of  "Mail,  mail!"  (Go  on, 
go  on!)  was  given,  and  the  final  laps  of  the  drive  began. 

The  hills  grew  full  of  sound.  The  beaters  sprang  up 
with  firebrand  and  rifle,  and  closed  swiftly  about  the  herd. 
The  animals  moved  slowly  at  first.  The  time  was  not  quite 
ripe  to  throw  them  into  a  panic.  Many  times  the  herd  would 
leave  their  trail  and  start  to  dip  into  a  valley  or  a  creek- 
bed,  but  always  there  was  a  new  crowd  of  beaters  to  block 
their  path.  But  presently  the  beaters  closed  in  on  them. 
Then  the  animals  began  a  wild  descent  squarely  toward  the 
mouth  of  the  keddah. 

"Hail"  the  wild  men  cried.  "Oh,  you  forest  pigs!  On, 
on!  Block  the  way  through  that  valley,  you  brainless  sons 
of  jackals!  Are  you  afraid?  A  if  Stand  close!  Watch, 
Puran!  Guard  your  post,  Khusru!  Now  on,  on — do  not 
let  them  halt!    Arret    Aihai!" 

Firebrands  waved,  rifles  cracked,  the  wild  shout  of  beat- 
ers increased  in  volume.  Then  men  closed  in,  driving 
the  beasts  before  them. 


The  Elephant  Remembers      231 

But  there  was  one  man  that  did  not  raise  his  voice. 
Through  all  the  turmoil  and  pandemonium  he  crouched  at 
the  end  of  the  stockade  wing,  tense  and  silent  and  alone. 
To  one  that  could  have  looked  into  his  eyes,  it  would  have 
seemed  that  his  thoughts  were  far  and  far  away.  It  was 
just  old  Langur  Dass,  named  for  a  monkey  and  despised 
of  men. 

He  was  waiting  for  the  instant  that  the  herd  would  come 
thundering  down  the  hill,  in  order  to  pass  lighted  firebrands 
to  the  bold  men  who  held  that  corner.  He  was  not  certain 
that  he  could  do  the  thing  he  had  set  out  to  do.  Perhaps 
the  herd  would  sweep  past  him,  through  the  gates.  If  he  did 
win,  he  would  have  to  face  alone  the  screaming,  infuriated 
hillmen,  whose  knives  were  always  ready  to  draw.  But 
knives  did  not  matter  now.  Langur  Dass  had  only  his  own 
faith  and  his  own  creed,  and  no  fear  could  make  him  be- 
tray them. 

Muztagh  had  lost  control  of  his  herd.  At  their  head  ran 
the  old  leader  that  he  had  worsted.  In  their  hour  of  fear 
they  had  turned  back  to  him.  What  did  this  youngster 
know  of  elephant  drives?  Ever  the  waving  firebrands  drew 
nearer,  the  beaters  lessened  their  circle,  the  avenues  of  es- 
cape became  more  narrow.  The  yawning  arms  of  the  stock- 
ade stretched  just  beyond. 

"Will  I  win,  jungle  gods?"  a  little  gray  man  at  the  keddah 
wing  was  whispering  to  the  forests.  "Will  I  save  you, 
great  one  that  I  knew  in  babyhood  ?  Will  you  go  down  into 
chains  before  the  night  is  done?  All  I  hear  the  thunder 
of  your  feet!  The  moment  is  almost  here.  And  now — 
your  last  chance,  Muztagh !" 

"Close  down,  close  down!"  Ahmad  Din  was  shouting 


. 


232     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

to  his  beaters.  "The  thing  is  done  in  another  moment. 
Hasten,  pigs  of  the  hills!    Raise  your  voice !    Now!    Aihcn!" 

The  herd  was  at  the  very  wings  of  the  stockade.  They 
had  halted  an  instant,  milling,  and  the  beaters  increased 
their  shouts.  Only  one  of  all  the  herd  seemed  to  know  the 
danger — Muztagh  himself — and  he  had  dropped  from  the 
front  rank  to  the  very  rear.  He  stood  with  uplifted  trunk, 
facing  the  approaching  rows  of  beaters.  And  there  seemed 
to  be  no  break  in  the  whole  line. 

The  herd  started  to  move  on,  into  the  wings  of  captivity ; 
and  they  did  not  heed  his  warning  squeals  to  turn.  The 
circle  of  fire  drew  nearer.  Then  his  trunk  seemed  to  droop, 
and  he  turned,  too.  He  could  not  break  the  line.  He 
turned  too,  toward  the  mouth  of  the  keddah. 

But  even  as  he  turned,  a  brown  figure  darted  toward 
him  from  the  end  of  the  wing.  A  voice  known  long  ago 
was  calling  to  him,  a  voice  that  penetrated  high  and  clear 
above  the  babble  of  the  beaters.  "Muztagh!"  it  was  crying. 
"Muztagh!" 

But  it  was  not  the  words  that  turned  Muztagh.  An 
elephant  can  not  understand  words,  except  a  few  elemental 
sounds  such  as  a  horse  or  dog  can  learn.  Rather  it  was 
the  smell  of  the  man,  remembered  from  long  ago,  and  the 
sound  of  his  voice,  never  quite  forgotten.  For  an  elephant 
never  forgets. 

"Muztagh !     Muztagh !" 

The  elephant  knew  him  now.  He  remembered  his  one 
friend  among  all  the  human  beings  that  he  knew  in  his 
calf-hood;  the  one  mortal  from  whom  he  had  received  love 
and  given  love  in  exchange. 

"More  firebrands!"  yelled  the  men  who  held  that  corner 
of  the  wing.     "Firebrands!     Where  is  Langur  Dass?"  but 


The  Elephant  Remembers       233 

instead  of  firebrands  that  would  have  frightened  beast  and 
aided  men,  Langur  Dass  stepped  out  from  behind  a  tree 
and  beat  at  the  heads  of  the  right-wing  guards  with  a  bamboo 
cane  that  whistled  and  whacked  and  scattered  them  into 
panic — yelling  all  the  while — "Muztagh !  O  my  Muztagh ! 
Here  is  an  opening!     Muztagh,  come!" 

And  Muztagh  did  come — trumpeting — crashing  like  an 
avalanche,  with  Langur  Dass  hard  after  him,  afraid,  now 
that  he  had  done  the  trick.  And  hot  on  the  trail  of  Langur 
Dass  ran  Ahmad  Din,  with  his  knife  drawn,  not  meaning 
to  let  that  prize  be  lost  to  him  at  less  than  the  cost  of  the 
trickster's  life. 

But  it  was  not  written  that  the  knife  should  ever  enter 
the  flesh  of  Langur  Dass. 

The  elephant  never  forgets,  and  Muztagh  was  monarch 
of  his  breed.  He  turned  back  two  paces,  and  struck  with 
his  trunk.  Ahmad  Din  was  knocked  aside  as  the  wind 
whips  a  straw. 

For  an  instant  elephant  and  man  stood  front  to  front.  To 
the  left  of  them  the  gates  of  the  stockade  dropped  shut 
behind  the  herd.  The  elephant  stood  with  trunk  slightly 
lifted,  for  the  moment  motionless.  The  long-haired  man 
who  had  saved  him  stood  with  upstretched  arms. 

It  was  such  a  scene  as  one  might  remember  in  an  old 
legend,  wherein  beasts  and  men  were  brothers,  or  such  as 
sometimes  might  steal,  like  something  remembered  from  an- 
other age,  into  a  man's  dreams.  Nowhere  but  in  India, 
where  men  have  a  little  knowledge  of  the  mystery  of  the 
elephant,  could  it  have  taken  place  at  all. 

For  Langur  Dass  was  speaking  to  my  lord  the  elephant: 

"Take  me  with  thee,  Muztagh!  Monarch  of  the  hills! 
Thou  and  I  are  not  of  the  world  of  men,  but  of  the  jungle 


234    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

and  the  rain,  the  silence,  and  the  cold  touch  of  rivers.  We 
are  brothers,  Muztagh.  O  beloved,  wilt  thou  leave  me 
here  to  die!" 

The  elephant  slowly  turned  his  head  and  looked  scorn- 
fully at  the  group  of  beaters  bearing  down  on  Langur  Dass, 
murder  shining  no  less  from  their  knives  than  from  their 
lighted  eyes. 

"Take  me,"  the  old  man  pleaded;  "thy  herd  is  gone." 

The  elephant  seemed  to  know  what  he  was  asking.  He 
had  lifted  him  to  his  great  shoulders  many  times,  in  the  last 
days  of  his  captivity.  And  besides,  his  old  love  for  Langur 
Dass  had  never  been  forgotten.  It  all  returned,  full  and 
strong  as  ever.     For  an  elephant  never  can  forget. 

It  was  not  one  of  the  man-herd  that  stood  pleading  be- 
fore him.  It  was  one  of  his  own  jungle  people,  just  as, 
deep  in  his  heart,  he  had  always  known.  So  with  one 
motion  light  as  air,  he  swung  him  gently  to  his  shoulder. 

The  jungle,  vast  and  mysterious  and  still,  closed  its  gates 
behind  them. 


THE  SERPENT  CITY 

It  was  curious  that  three  such  good  woodsmen  should  wander 
into  the  hills  and  fade  from  the  earth.  But  as  they  were  men 
steeped  in  iniquity,  no  one  mourned  their  loss. — From  a  Frontiers- 
man's Diary. 

There  is  one  mystery  in  the  Southern  Oregon  mountains 
that  never  grows  old,  and  never  is  understood.  Even 
ancient  Abe  Carver,  who  knew  the  strange  ranges  as  never 
geologist  can  hope  to  know  them,  who  had  melted  snow  in 
his  veins  for  blood,  and  strata  in  his  frame  for  bones,  found 
it  a  fresh  marvel  at  every  fall  of  darkness.  It  is  the 
mystery  of  the  mountain  night. 

It  doesn't  seem  to  be  the  same  night  that  falls  over  cities 
and  plains.  Even  the  stars  look  different.  There  is  no 
smoke  to  hide  or  blur  them,  and  they  seem  to  hang  just  at 
the  top  points  of  the  tall,  dark  pines.  Once  really  to  see 
them,  the  people  say,  is  to  lose  at  once  the  worst  of  a 
man's  fears  of  that  time-honored  bogy,  death.  They  give 
a  queer  feeling  of  insignificance,  too,  that  is  remarkably  good 
for  men.     But  they  are  just  a  small  part  of  the  mystery. 

There  are  the  smells,  never  to  be  forgotten.  One  of  them 
comes  from  the  balsam,  and  is  more  wonderful  than  any 
chemical  perfume  could  possibly  be,  and  gives  more  light, 
far-flying  dreams  than  is  possible  with  opium.  Some  of 
them  come  from  the  lakes  that  make  a  silver  chain  from 
one  end  of  the  Back  Country  to  the  other, — and  smell  of  wet 
banks  and  Heaven  alone  knows  what.  Blending  in  the 
mixture  are  such  good  and  healthy  smells  as  sun-baked  earth, 


236     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

and  fern  beds,  and  tiny,  shy  mountain  daisies  that  are  almost 
as  hard  to  see  as  the  little  rock  rabbits  close  to  the  snow  line. 
These  are  the  smells  that  a  man  can  perceive,  but  of 
course  a  man  has  a  ridiculously  rudimentary  sense  of  smell. 
You  can  tell,  by  watching  the  night  hunting  of  a  wolf, 
that  he  experiences  a  whole  scale  of  smells  on  either  side 
of  the  little  octave  known  to  men. 

Then  there  are  the  sounds  that  make  a  mystery  just  by 
themselves.  Of  course,  the  human  sense  of  hearing  has 
very  limited  and  definite  frontiers,  but  even  for  human 
ears  the  mountains  have  enough  unknown  sounds  to  draw 
a  man's  thoughts,  as  a  sponge  draws  water,  far  into  the 
strange,  little-used  spaces  of  his  mind,  where  he  does  not 
like  to  have  them  go.  Students  who  have  sat  in  a  col- 
legiate class  of  psychology  and  have  watched  the  tuning- 
fork  experiment  are  best  able  to  understand  these  human 
limits.  As  the  note  sounds  higher  and  higher,  fewer  and 
fewer  students  are  able  to  hear  it,  until  only  one  is  left. 
At  the  next  note  the  one  remaining  cannot  hear,  either.  But 
it  is  perfectly  evident  that  the  forks  are  still  making  vibra- 
tions, if  the  human  ears  were  only  tuned  to  hear  them. 
It  is  the  same  below  the  lowest  note  that  a  human  ear  can 
perceive.  And  part  of  the  mystery  of  the  mountain  night 
is  the  ever-present  impression  that  if  one's  ears  were  just 
a  little  sharper,  there  would  be  a  thousand  sounds  that 
people  have  never  dreamed  of.  But  after  all,  perhaps  these 
limits  are  a  good  thing.  As  it  is,  men  are  having  a  hard 
enough  time  clinging  to  their  long-harbored  theories  of  life 
and  death. 

The  limbs  of  the  pines  scratch  and  rub  together  with 
a  very  curious  sound.  It  is  always  right  over  your  head, 
and  it  dies  away  on  each  side  of  you.     The  wind  tries  to 


The  Serpent  City  237 

force  its  way  through  the  brush  thicket,  and  its  sound  is  like 
a  whimper  of  disappointment.  There  are  a  thousand  sounds, 
no  two  alike,  that  the  wind  can  make.  A  few  of  the  mil- 
lion noises  of  the  insect  world  are  pitched  in  the  right  key 
for  human  beings  to  hear,  and  always  you  are  dimly  aware 
that  some  creature  is  stalking  some  other  creature  in  the 
shadows  just  beyond.  The  stalking  wolf  is  one  of  the 
most  silent  creatures  in  the  world,  but  now  and  then  he 
cracks  a  twig,  or  crushes  a  leaf.  And  the  darkness  itself 
is  a  mystery,  particularly  when  the  moon  is  shining  through  it. 

It  doesn't  seem  merely  an  absence  of  light.  It  seems 
as  if  it  were  something  in  itself  that  drops  down  from  the 
mountain  tops.  It  drops  with  startling  speed,  and  it  lifts 
the  same  way.  And  through  it,  now  and  then,  you  can  see 
far-away  forests  that  seem  to  have  silver  poured  over  them, 
and  curiously  dark  valleys,  and  strange,  deep  glens.  The 
whole  region  is  strange  beyond  words, — with  its  endless 
forests  and  its  mysterious  lakes  and  its  stone  heaps  piled 
without  reason  or  sense,  and  its  creeks  that  fade  away  when 
you  need  them  most, — but  particularly  it  is  strange  at  night. 
People  call  it  the  Back  Country  because  they  don't  know 
any  other  name  for  it.  It  is  back  somewhere  behind  the 
hills,  and  since  deer  and  mines  and  things  can  be  pro- 
cured at  the  very  edge  of  it,  there  is  no  sense  in  entering 
it  very  far.  As  a  result,  the  long-tailed  jays  still  shriek 
with  astonishment  and  amazement  every  time  one  of  the 
curious  forked  creatures  called  men  comes  into  their  sight. 

It  isn't  good  to  be  lost  in  the  Back  Country.  There  are 
no  landmarks  to  guide  one  out.  Streams  are  often  very  hard 
to  find,  and  the  human  body,  not  very  good  at  best,  soon 
becomes  tired  of  climbing  a  thousand  ridges  that  look  ex- 
actly alike.     Besides,  the  long,  wild  shriek  of  the  moun- 


238     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

tain  lion  is  apt  to  frighten  a  man  into  that  deadly  mistake 
of  running  in  a  circle  in  the  dark.  Of  course,  the  true- 
breed  mountain  lion,  weighing  one  hundred  and  fifty  pounds 
at  the  most,  is  the  worst  coward  in  the  mountains,  but  his 
kill-scream  is  very  disconcerting  and  terrible. 

The  night  had  just  dropped  down  about  Abe  Carver's 
cabin;  and  the  wonder  that  is  a  remembered  echo  of  the 
fear  that  men  had  in  a  younger  world  brought  a  curious 
glow  into  his  eyes.  He  was  hardly  conscious  of  it.  He  had 
other  things  to  think  about  to-night,  for  just  that  day  a 
very  dear  and  ancient  friend  had  wandered  away  into  the 
ridges,  and  the  hills  are  always  full  of  death  traps  for  the 
unsuspecting.  They  have  always  one  trick  more  to  play, 
even  when  a  mountaineer  thinks  he  has  learned  them  all. 

People  knew  at  the  first  glance  at  Abe  Carver  that  in 
some  one  great  factor  he  differed  from  the  common  run  of 
mountain  men.  What  the  difference  was  they  usually 
couldn't  say.  He  dressed  just  like  the  rest,  mostly  in  buck- 
skin, which  wears  like  iron  and  does  not  require  constant 
cleaning.  Then,  his  hair  was  strange  and  gray  and  long; 
his  arms  and  legs  were  hard  and  knotted;  and  his  face 
was  scarred  and  deep-lined,  like  the  faces  of  the  mountains 
themselves.     But  here  all  likeness  abruptly  stopped. 

The  mountain  men  never  looked  squarely  into  Carver's 
eyes.  They  couldn't  have  told  just  why.  They  were 
not  afraid  of  him, — at  least,  they  did  not  fear  bodily 
injury  at  his  hands.  He  was  neither  particularly  fast  with 
a  pistol  nor  particularly  strong.  His  eyes  were  rather  large, 
and  they  had  a  peculiar  fixation.  They  were  blue  in  color, 
and  they  were  always  noticeably  bright.  The  eyelids  didn't 
seem  to  close  down  as  often  as  is  natural. 

Children    have   bright   eyes,    but   this    brightness   of   his 


The  Serpent  City  239 

was  not  the  kind  that  people  love  to  see  in  the  eyes  of  a 
child.  Strong  drink  can  brighten  a  man's  eyes,  and  there 
are  certain  emotions,  like  fear  and  pleasure,  that  make 
them  sparkle.  Carver's  eyes  had  no  such  warm  bright- 
ness as  is  caused  by  these  things.  The  light  to  be  seen 
under  his  brows  was  just  as  cold  as  the  glitter  that  moun- 
taineers behold  on  the  face  of  the  snow  banks  in  the  winter 
sun. 

Carver  had  lived  too  long  in  the  mountains  and  had  im- 
bued too  much  of  their  spirit.  He  had  stepped  beyond  the 
pale  ordained  for  human  beings,  and  the  mark  of  a  strange, 
outer  world  was  beneath  his  lids.  The  gaunt  wolves, 
howling  from  the  hilltops  at  night,  have  something  of  the 
same  glitter  in  their  eyes.  You  can  catch  it  sometimes  in 
the  eyes  of  the  little  cowardly  lynx  that  will  mew  on  your 
trail  all  day  but  never  dares  attack.  And  most  of  all  it 
is  the  property  of  the  gliding  people  that  live  on  the  lowest 
of  the  three  planes  that  make  up  forest  life. 

If  human  beings  had  that  look  in  a  younger  world,  they 
have  mostly  got  away  from  it  long  since.  There  is  no  need 
for  it  in  farms  and  cities.  It  is  an  inheritance  from  a 
wilder,  more  savage  time,  and  now  it  remains  the  mark  of 
a  wilder,  more  savage  world  that  begins  where  the  habita- 
tions of  men  leave  off.  It  is  the  mark  of  remorseless- 
ness,  inexorable  as  the  cold  in  winter.  It  is  the  brand  of 
the  kind  of  mercy  one  may  expect  from  a  wolf  pack  in 
the  snow,  or  the  rattlesnake  on  the  rock.  The  other  brands 
Carver  had — a  peculiar  stealthy  quality  in  his  walk,  and 
a  queer  repressed  note  in  his  voice — were  far  too  obscure 
for  any  except  the  eyes  of  a  naturalist.  And  no  naturalist 
would  believe  them  if  he  saw  them. 

Abe  Carver  walked  up  and  down  in  front  of  his  cabin; 


240    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

and  now  and  then  he  searched  with  his  eyes  the  distant 
hillsides.  The  dark  was  over  them,  but  his  eyes  were 
trained  to  see  in  the  darkness.  Sometimes  he  put  his  fingers 
to  his  lips  and  gave  a  whistled  call  that  seemed  to  re- 
echo endlessly  among  the  pines. 

"Funny  thing,"  he  breathed.  "All  the  time  I've  had  him, 
he  hasn't  been  gone  at  feedin'  time  before." 

The  old  man  seemed  very  haggard  and  broken  as  he 
began  to  prepare  his  simple  meal.  It  had  been  years  since 
he  had  supped  alone.  Always  the  same  faithful,  loving 
friend  had  been  crouched  at  his  feet.  To-night  he  was 
gone;  and  Abe  was  very  lonely  and  apprehensive  indeed. 

There  is  a  kind  of  fatalism  in  the  creed  of  the  mountains; 
but  it  isn't  the  same  kind  that  is  to  be  found  among  such 
old  peoples  as  the  Chinese  or  the  Arabs.  With  the  latter, 
nothing  seems  to  matter  much  one  way  or  another;  and 
things  matter  very  much  indeed  in  the  mountains.  The 
mountaineer  is  perfectly  indifferent  to  the  inevitability  of 
death;  but  what  are  half-felt  emotions  among  the  plains- 
men are  passions  with  him.  He  cannot  forget  an  injury. 
He  may  not  know  the  meaning  of  pity;  but  he  loves  with 
the  devotion  of  a  dog  for  his  master.  The  farther  one 
goes  into  the  Outer  World  of  the  Wild,  the  more  simple 
and  intense  emotions  become.  Abe  Carver  had  only  one 
love,  and  he  gave  him  all  the  affection  of  his  heart.  That 
love  was  his  shaggy  hound,  his  companion  in  the  hunt,  his 
partner  in  his  explorations,  the  sharer  of  his  troubles,  his 
defender  and  slave  and   friend. 

Shag  had  trotted  away  on  one  of  his  endless  hill  journeys 
at  noon  that  day.  He  had  taken  the  trail  that  went  down 
toward  the  Trotter  place.  Abe  would  rather  have  had 
him  go  in  any  other  direction.    He  did  not  like  the  Trotters, 


The  Serpent  City  241 

new  from  a  mountain  district  in  the  East.  They  were 
grimy  and  vile-tongued  and  malignant;  and  he  had  once 
had  a  dispute  in  court  with  them  over  a  trap  line.  Always 
before,  Shag  had  returned,  bounding  like  a  wolf  down  the 
slopes,  when  the  sky  first  changed  to  green  at  sunset.  It 
was  nearly  nine  now;  and  he  had  not  yet  come. 

"We'll  get  you  yet,"  the  Trotters  had  told  Carver  at 
the  door  of  the  court  that  day.  " We'll  bust  you  open  like 
a  ripe  papaw!"  And  then  they  had  whispered  oaths  down 
on  his  head, — such  oaths  as  only  men  who  know  the  sav- 
age mountains  can  possibly  conceive. 

"But  they  wouldn't  have  shot  my  Shag,"  the  old  man  mut- 
tered into  his  coffee  cup.  "They  couldn't  have  done  a  thing 
like  that." 

But  he  was  lying  to  himself,  and  he  knew  it.  There 
was  nothing  too  low  and  mean  for  the  Trotters.  In  this 
way  they  differed  from  most  of  the  mountain  men,  and 
even  the  mountain  creatures  that  range  the  forest.  The 
latter  can  be  terrible  and  cruel,  but  they  cannot  be  low. 
It  is  against  the  laws  of  the  wild. 

The  night  drew  on,  hour  after  hour.  Supper  was  done. 
Carver  built  his  fire  high;  and  like  a  form  in  some  curious 
dark-colored  stone,  he  stood  waiting  at  the  doorway.  He 
did  not  seem  to  move  a  hand  or  lift  a  shoulder.  Men  who 
have  waited  on  deer  trails  know  that  the  most  draining 
conduct  in  the  world  is  to  remain  perfectly  motionless, 
yet  Abe  had  stood  without  motion  for  two  long  hours, 
evidently  without  fatigue. 

It  isn't  exactly  a  human  quality,  and  it  would  have  been 
most  disconcerting  to  watch.  A  lizard  on  a  stone  may 
have  that  same  impassive  immobility;  and  it  is  particularly 
a  quality  of  the  serpents.     But  even  the  larger  forest  beasts 


242    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

seem  to  lack  the  muscle  control  to  do  it  easily.  Carver 
stood  with  his  arms  loose-hung,  his  strange,  fixed  eyes 
gazing  down  the  trail. 

"It  couldn't  be  that  them  Trotters  have  got  him,"  he 
said  again.    "If  they  have " 

The  words  ended  in  a  sort  of  throaty  sob.  For  there 
are  certain  emotions,  as  all  men  know,  that  cannot  find 
expression  in  words.  The  words  for  them  have  died  from 
the  language  in  these  gentler  days. 

Then  his  gray  head  lifted,  almost  imperceptibly.  Far 
away  down  the  trail  he  could  hear  a  sound  that  was  not 
part  of  the  natural  noises  of  the  night.  Above  the  sound 
of  the  tree  limbs,  above  the  stir  of  the  wind  in  the  brush 
thickets,  he  heard  a  faint,  low  whimper,  almost  like  the 
noise  of  the  wind  itself.  And  the  next  instant  came  an 
echo  of  the  old,  familiar  bark  of  welcome.  But  it  was  just 
an  echo, — the  cry  of  a  brave  heart  that  remembers  even 
as  it  dies. 

At  once  the  motionless  muscles  of  the  man  sprang  to  life. 
He  leaped  down  the  trail;  and  a  spectator  would  have 
been  curiously  reminded  of  the  lunge  of  a  serpent.  The 
motion  was  so  unbelievably  fast,  so  silent.  And  in  another 
instant  the  dying  dog  was  whimpering  in  his  arms. 

Its  two  hind  legs  were  broken;  the  man  could  see  where 
the  brave  animal  had  dragged  them  in  the  dust  of  the  moon- 
lit trail.  The  hairy  coat  was  matted  and  wet;  and  the 
great,  intelligent  head  was  terribly  battered  and  broken. 

The  dog  did  not  shrink  at  the  sight  of  the  blue  pistol 
pointing  squarely  in  the  moonlight.  It  could  see  the  eyes 
that  aimed  along  it,  full  of  the  same  love  it  had  always 
seen.  When  the  man's  eyes  had  that  look,  they  were  never 
to  be  feared.    The  pistol  flame  leaped  in  the  dark.    And  then 


The  Serpent  City  243 

the  only  sound  on  the  mountain  trail  was  the  faint  rustle 
of  leaves  stirred  by  the  quivering  muscles  of  the  dying 
animal,  and  the  loving,  whispered  curses  of  a  weeping  man. 
It  was  a  long  time  after  this  that  he  left  the  stiffen- 
ing body  and  walked  on  down  the  trail.  He  went  toward  the 
cabin  on  the  lower  level  where  the  Trotters  lived.  He 
went  very  softly,  very  smoothly,  as  if  with  no  muscular 
exertion.  A  snowshoe  rabbit  leaped  and  fled  from  his 
trail.  The  little  squeak  of  terror  that  it  uttered  was  the 
same  that  its  breed  had  learned  in  long  ages,  at  the  sight 
of  a  serpent  descending  from  its  ledges  on  its  night-hunt- 
ing. 

There  are  three  planes  of  life  in  the  mountains,  and  the 
laws  are  the  same  for  each.  The  middle  plane  consists 
of  all  those  creatures  whose  byways  are  the  game  trails 
in  the  brush  and  on  the  hills:  the  wolves  that  never  are 
full-fed,  the  larger  bears,  deer  like  streaks  of  brown  light, 
and  the  stately  elk.  The  upper  plane  is  the  tree  people  and 
the  winged  creatures.  Here  is  the  lynx  that  lies  so  close 
to  the  great  branches  of  the  trees  that  he  is  all  but  invisible, 
the  gray  squirrels,  and  such  grotesque  creatures  as  the  porcu- 
pine,— always  the  last  hope  of  a  wanderer  lost  and  starving 
in  the  mountains.  And  finally  there  is  the  under  plane, 
knowledge  of  which  is  still  mostly  a  mystery  except  to  the 
greatest  naturalists. 

In  this  plane  are  the  rodents,  the  marmots  and  rabbits 
and  mice  and  chipmunk,  whose  forests  are  the  ferns.  And 
worse  than  any  of  these  are  the  poison  folk,  the  gray, 
speckled  rattlesnakes  on  the  rocks.  The  casual  hunter 
in  the  hills  does  not  see  these  poison  people.  In  the  first 
place,  most  of  them  are  nocturnal  in  their  habits.     Besides, 


244     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

they  are  perfectly  camouflaged  by  nature  to  match  the  rocks 
and  dust  in  which  they  lie.  Hunters  very  rarely  go  to 
the  rock  ledges  that  they  love,  the  breeding  places  where 
sometimes  a  hundred  of  them  will  sun  themselves  on  the 
same  cliff.  And  of  all  the  creatures  of  the  wild,  theirs 
is  the  most  remorseless  creed. 

The  wolf  turns  aside  at  the  sound  of  their  warning  rattle. 
The  cattle  forsake  the  slopes  where  they  take  their  sun 
baths.  They  have  learned  in  long  years  to  expect  no  mercy 
from  the  poison  folk,  for  the  reptiles  have  a  cold  malig- 
nancy toward  all  other  living  things, — perhaps  because  far 
back  in  their  evil  minds  they  can  remember  when  they 
were  the  rulers  and  owners  of  the  whole  world,  and  they 
are  jealous  of  these  intruders.  They  strike  not  only  in 
self-defense  or  in  hunting,  like  most  of  the  forest  people. 
Men  who  have  been  struck  by  a  head  that  leaped  like 
a  whip-lash  from  beneath  a  rock  are  well  aware  of  this 
fact, — if  they  survive  to  be  aware  of  anything.  The  birds 
hate  them  because  when  the  glittering  eyes  meet  their  own, 
all  power  to  fly  away  passes  from  their  wings.  The  little 
mice  and  smaller  rodents  squeak  with  terror  at  just  the 
rustle  of  the  leaves  in  the  shadow.  And  even  men,  re- 
membering from  a  remote  time  a  great  breed  of  serpents 
that  hunted  in  the  darkness  just  without  their  caves,  hate 
and  fear  them  too. 

They  do  not  understand  them.  They  never  quite  under- 
stood the  miracle  of  their  changing  skins,  their  long  fasts 
from  food  and  drink,  thdir  motionless  slumber  on  the 
rocks.  Men  know  that  the  bite  from  a  full-grown  rattler 
is  often  a  very  quick  and  unhappy  death;  for  the  venom 
itself,  a  certain  complex  combination  of  proteids,  is  almost 


The  Serpent  City  245 

as  deadly  a  substance  as  the  wisest  chemist  can  evolve  in 
a  laboratory. 

The  poison  folk  were  Abe  Carver's  life  and  study.  He 
had  not  inherited  the  usual  fear  of  them.  Even  in  his  boy- 
hood he  would  leave  his  play  to  follow  the  gliding  forms 
through  the  grass.  Their  eyes,  their  habits,  their  strange, 
malignant  lives,  had  been  a  fascination  to  him  in  all  his 
long  years.  And  he  knew  things  about  them  that  no  living 
man  ever  knew  before. 

His  first  study  was  the  blue-racers,  and  the  garter  and 
gopher  snakes,  and  such  snakes  as  kill  their  food  by  constric- 
tion of  their  coiling  bodies.  They  could  exert  a  most  re- 
markable pressure,  as  the  little  Abe  learned  after  many 
experiments;  but  compared  to  the  rattlers  they  were  dull 
and  stupid  things.  He  had  watched  them  do  their  strange 
dances  in  the  moonlight;  he  had  seen  them  attack  a  great 
toad  that  had  been  frozen  in  its  tracks  with  horror.  Later 
he  beheld  the  same  mystery  in  the  rattlers. 

Then  one  day  Abe  had  followed  a  great  rattler  from 
the  river  bank  far  up  precipitous  trails  to  a  wonderful 
serpent  colony  on  the  rocks.  A  man  may  live  years  in  the 
hills  and  never  find  one  of  these  places;  but  once  he  does, 
he  remembers  it  to  the  day  he  dies.  And  he  will  go  many 
paces  out  of  his  way  to  avoid  the  place  again. 

The  serpent  cities  are  great  fragments  of  broken  ledge 
where  the  rattlesnakes  gather  in  countless  hundreds.  No 
man  knows  what  their  business  is.  No  man  can  imagine 
what  consultations  the  great  gray  king  rattlers  have  among 
themselves,  what  the  females — no  less  deadly  and  twice  as 
malignant — say  to  one  another,  and  why  they  lie  for  such 
endless  hours  so  still  upon  the  rocks. 

Sometimes  they  lie   apart,   and  sometimes  a  number  of 


246     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

them  will  make  a  ghastly  mass  like  the  twined  locks  of  a 
Medusa.  Sometimes  they  stretch  two  and  two,  and  often 
the  great  males  will  battle  to  the  death  for  a  resting  place 
on  a  rock  too  small  for  both.  All  these  things  Abe  Carver 
had  seen,  and  if  any  man  in  the  world  knew  the  why  and 
wherefore  of  them  all,  Abe  Carver  was  he. 

Abe  had  been  bitten  many  times,  but  he  had  always 
carried  antidotes  of  the  most  scientific  and  effective  kind. 
And  long  ago  he  had  become  immune  to  rattler's  venom. 
He  wore  tall,  tough  boots — for  a  rattler's  bite  is  painful 
even  when  one  is  immune  to  its  toxin — and  he  wore 
long  gloves  over  his  wrists  and  hands.  The  gloves  were 
just  as  important  as  the  boots,  because  in  climbing  over 
the  snake  city  a  man  could  only  make  progress  by  using 
both  hands  and  feet. 

At  twenty-one  he  had  a  knowledge  of  rattlesnakes  past 
that  of  any  naturalist  of  his  period  in  the  world.  At  forty 
the  poison  folk  that  ever  coil  and  glide  and  strike  and 
dance  on  the  rocks  were  his  cult  and  his  life  and  his  eternal 
mystery.  But  at  sixty  he  had  passed  all  this.  He  had 
lived  too  long  in  the  under  plane.  In  a  measure  they  had 
become  his  own  people.  They  did  not  mystify  him  now. 
Except  for  a  dog  that  whined  and  cowered  at  the  extreme 
frontier  of  the  snake  city,  they  were  the  one  remaining  in- 
terest in  his  life. 

At  sixty  Abe  Carver  had  broken  one  of  the  few  great 
underlying  laws  of  the  universe.  He  had  probed  too  deeply 
into  a  mystery  that  had  not  been  meant  for  human  beings 
to  know.  It  has  been  the  same  since  the  beginning  of  the 
world.  There  have  been  men  who  have  looked  too  far 
into  the  occult  sciences  of  the  East, — and  their  story  is  a 
good  one  to  forget.     There  is  a  more  recent  story  of  a 


The  Serpent  City  247 

man  who  purposely  went  to  prison  to  study  the  ways  of 
criminals  and  came  out  a  criminal  himself.  Abe  Carver 
had  lain  for  too  many  long  sunlit  hours  watching  the  cease- 
less coiling  of  the  poison  folk.  He  had  gazed  too  long 
into  their  glittering  eyes.  There  had  been  a  time  when 
he  wondered  at  himself,  at  the  strange  pleasure  he  took 
in  the  touch  of  their  cold  bodies;  but  that  was  past.  He 
had  once  started  with  amazement  at  the  sight  of  his  own 
bright  eyes  in  a  looking-glass;  but  long  ago  he  had  be- 
come accustomed  to  their  glitter.  And  once  another  moun- 
taineer had  shuddered  and  sworn  that  Carver  moved 
through  the  hills  like  a  snake  itself;  but  Abe  had  forgotten 
that  his  reply  had  only  been  a  laugh.  These  were  just 
externals,  simply  unconscious  imitation.  But  too  many 
times  he  had  watched  the  night  hunting  of  the  snakes,  had 
seen  their  cold  rage  in  battles;  their  own  remorselessness 
had  grown  into  his  blood  and  fiber. 

They  feared  him  no  more.  He  had  learned  to  imitate 
a  little  whispered  call — more  like  a  hiss  than  a  word — by 
which  they  knew  their  friends;  a  sound  that  long  ago  he 
had  learned  was  the  snakes'  peace  greeting.  He  could  whis- 
per it  softly  at  the  first  stir  of  a  gray  ribbon  beneath  a 
rock,  and  it  meant  that  he  could  pass  back  and  forth  un- 
challenged. 

Just  once  as  Carver  walked  down  the  moonlit  trail  to 
the  Trotters'  house,  he  had  to  utter  the  call.  Just  as 
he  had  come  down  into  the  lower  hills,  a  gray  shadow  had 
streaked  across  his  path.  And  for  the  first  time  since  he 
had  left  his  dead  companion  on  the  trail,  he  paused  tensely. 

His  eyes  probed  into  the  darkness  where  the  snake  had 
vanished.  It  had  been  but  a  gopher  snake,  after  all;  but 
it  had  started  a  queer  current  of  thought  in  his  mind.    What 


248     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

had  he  meant  to  do  by  this  blind  advance?  The  Trotters 
were  three,  all  of  them  dead  shots  and  in  the  prime  of  their 
strength;  and  he  was  only  one.  Does  a  wolf  attack  when 
he  has  odds  of  three  against  him  ? 

He  had  come  up  blindly  from  the  trail,  his  heart  full 
of  such  cold  hatred  as  most  men  have  long  ago  lost  the 
power  to  feel.  Hatred  must  have  exercise  as  well  as  any 
other  emotion,  or  it  dries  up  like  the  poison  duct  of  a 
snake  of  fifty  winters, — and  too  many  years  of  peace  have 
killed  the  power  of  most  human  beings  to  feel  it.  But 
Carver  had  had  good  teachers. 

Even  at  first  it  had  not  been  the  kind  of  hatred  that 
ignites  the  brain  and  heart  and  makes  a  man  helpless  be- 
fore his  foes.  Thoughts  must  be  allowed  free  play;  brains 
must  be  kept  clear;  this  is  one  of  the  first  laws  of  the 
wilderness.  Yet  he  had  not  stopped  to  plan.  He  was 
dimly  cognizant  of  some  wild  and  daring  impulse  to  attack 
all  three  of  the  Trotters  as  they  sat  in  their  cottage;  of 
slaying  them  as  a  wolf  slays  sheep.  Yet  in  a  single  moment 
of  clear  thinking  he  knew  that  his  one  hope  lay  in  strategy 
alone. 

He  might  kill  one  of  them ;  but  surely  the  deadly  aim  of 
one  of  the  other  two  would  end  his  own  life.  One  was  not 
enough.  Besides,  the  preservation  of  one's  life  is  the 
first  law  of  the  forest,  and  no  plan  must  be  considered 
that  entailed  its  loss. 

Abe  walked  softly,  stealthily  down  into  the  first  clear- 
ings. Once  a  horse  neighed  wildly  and  fled  in  unlooked- 
for  terror,  and  once  a  toad,  usually  so  dull  and  stolid, 
hopped  frantically  into  the  darkness.  In  a  little  while  he 
saw  the  windows  of  the  Trotter  cottage. 

The   men   had   not  yet   gone   to  bed;   but  the  fact   did 


The  Serpent  City  249 

not  surprise  Carver.  Of  course  they  had  been  looking  for 
Abe  to  attempt  some  stroke  of  vengeance;  and  they  had 
no  intention  of  being  found  asleep.  Abe  felt  a  little  shiver 
of  gladness,  something  like  the  first  rapture  of  passion; 
for  the  more  tired  they  were  in  the  next  day's  business,  the 
longer  were  the  odds  against  them.  He  stole  up  to  the 
window. 

The  three  of  them  were  sitting  in  their  filthy  room;  and 
drowsiness  had  begun  to  dull  the  savagery  of  their  faces. 
All  evening  through  they  had  waited  for  Abe  to  come;  and 
now  that  he  was  here,  they  did  not  know  it.  They  were 
three   great,   dark  men,    foul  of   tongue  and  evil   of   face. 

"We  might  as  well  go  to  bed,"  the  oldest  Trotter  was 
saying.     "The  skunk  ain't  comin'." 

The  second  brother  stood  up  and  stretched  out  his  arms. 
"He  ain't  got  the  nerve.  Whatever  made  you  think  he 
had?     He's  crazy,  anyway — you  can  see  it  in  his  eyes." 

"I  don't  like  them  eyes,"  the  youngest  of  the  three  ob- 
jected. And  he  ought  to  have  known,  for  they  were  fast 
upon  him  as  he  spoke. 

The  others  laughed.  "He's  a  bluff — and  what  could  he 
do  against  the  three  of  us?  We'd  shoot  him  like  a  rat  be- 
fore he  got  his  guns  out.  But  one  of  us  had 'better  keep 
watch.     We'll  take  turns  at  it — two  hours  each." 

"Maybe  his  dog  died  on  the  trail,  and  he  hasn't  seen  him 
yet,"  the  youngest  of  the  three  went  on.  "We'd  hate  to 
have  to  carry  him  up  and  throw  him  in  old  Abe's  bed." 

The  three  of  them  laughed, — a  grim,  terrible  sound  that 
rocked  out  into  the  quiet  night.  The  old  man's  lower  teeth 
gnawed  at  his  lip.  He  was  shaking  all  over  now,  yet  not 
enough  to  stir  the  dead  leaves  under  his  feet.  It  was  not 
nervousness,  except  in  the  sense  that  all  wild  creatures  are 


250     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

nervous  at  the  beginning  of  a  hunt.  It  was  hatred  that 
seemed  to  shiver  his  heart  to  pieces. 

"I  tried  to  leave  enough  life  in  him  to  get  home,"  the 
older  brother  answered.  And  they  chortled  again.  Then 
they  lay  down  in  their  clothes  to  sleep. 

They  did  not  dream  of  the  two  remorseless  eyes  that 
glittered  through  the  windowpane.  And  then,  as  a  shadow 
goes,  the  old  man  glided  away.  He  went  into  the  deepest 
brush;  and  the  lessons  of  silence  he  had  learned  on  the 
rock  ledges  laid  his  feet  like  cushions  against  the  dry  twigs. 
Then  his  lids  slowly  closed  over  his  fixed  eyes,  and  he  went 
to  sleep. 

There  was  work  to  do  on  the  morrow;  and  work  to  be 
done  well  needs  fresh  muscles  and  clear  thought  such  as 
only  sleep  can  give.  Fifty  feet  to  his  right  a  wolf  slept 
through  the  early  night  hours,  waiting  for  the  hunting 
time  in  the  dawn.  One  hundred  to  his  left  a  rattlesnake 
curled  about  a  rock  still  warm  from  the  previous  day's  sun ; 
and  it  was  deep  in  its  slumber.  And  to  one  that  looked  down 
from  the  clouds,  the  three  would  have  seemed  of  the  same 
breed. 

The  long,  silent  wait  in  the  brush  would  have  been  a 
physical  drain  on  some  men,  but  Abe  knew  just  how  to 
lie  relaxed  and  conserve  his  strength.  The  night  drew  to 
morning — a  dawn  that  leaped  up  over  the  mountains  wherein 
the  trees  sprang  out  of  the  shadow  one  by  one  and  grew 
clear-lined — and  the  morning  drew  till  noon.  The  vigilance 
of  the  Trotters  had  grown  ever  less  as  the  morning  hours 
went  by.  When  they  came  in  to  dinner  at  noon,  they  had 
decided  that  Carver  would  attempt  no  vengeance  at  all. 

They  did  not  know  that  even  a  toothless  wolf  will  fight 
to  the  death,   and  that   a  rattlesnake  will  strike  after  its 


The  Serpent  City  251 

poison  glands  are  dried  up  with  age.  If  they  had  known 
these  things,  they  might  have  been  more  watchful  when  they 
went  out  to  their  work  in  the  afternoon. 

They  did  not  see  Abe  creep  into  the  house.  If  he  had 
glided  in  the  dust  like  his  poison  people,  he  could  have 
scarcely  been  less  visible.  Even  the  buzzard  that  keeps 
grim  watch  over  all  the  mountains  did  not  see  him. 

The  house  was  quite  deserted.  It  was  full  of  the  odors 
of  uncleanliness, — a  quality  very  hard  to  endure  by  one 
accustomed  to  the  clean  smells  of  the  woods.  And  there 
were  hardly  enough  articles  of  value  in  the  house  for  his 
decoy.  It  didn't  much  matter,  however.  The  sight  of 
him  leaving  the  cabin  with  a  full  sack  would  be  enough  to 
put  them  on  his  trail. 

He  emptied  the  potatoes  from  a  burlap  sack,  then  filled 
the  bag  with  such  things  as  he  thought  the  Trotters  valued 
most.  Then  he  put  in  a  light  comforter  to  give  the  bag 
an  appearance  of  weight  and  bulk. 

But  he  was  not  through  yet.  The  Trotters  carried  their 
pistols,  but  their  rifles  were  hung  on  the  deer  horns  over  the 
little  fireplace.  A  well-aimed  rifle  bullet  might  end  the 
adventure  before  it  had  begun;  and  his  next  business  was 
to  spike  the  guns  beyond  repair.  It  was  not  hard  to  do, 
with  a  hammer  and  a  brick  from  the  fireplace. 

He  did  not  work  in  silence  now.  A  little  noise  was  bet- 
ter. If  the  Trotters  heard  and  came,  their  dog  would 
surely  reach  him  before  they  did.  And  he  did  not  wish  too 
long  a  start  on  them.  He  merely  wanted  to  remain  just 
out  of  pistol  range.  And  now  only  one  gun  remained  un- 
broken. 

He  was  still  cold  as  steel;  and  the  only  change  in  him 
was  an  added  brilliancy  in  his  reptile  eyes.     But  a  mad- 


252     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

ness  was  creeping  through  his  blood  like  a  poison.  His  face 
was  curiously  white;  and  his  motions,  ever  quickened,  be- 
came more  lithe  and  sinuous.  His  age  had  fallen  from  his 
shoulders  in  a  breath.  With  a  clang  and  clash  he  struck 
the  fireplace  wall  with  the  last  of  the  three  rifles  and  the 
lock  shattered  to  pieces. 

Far  away,  through  the  windows,  he  saw  the  three  Trot- 
ters stop  in  their  work.  It  was  just  as  he  had  hoped.  He 
shouted  at  them,  a  scream  of  fury,  and  crouched  to  wait 
the  onslaught  of  the  dog.  It  was  bounding  across  the  fields 
toward  the  cabin;  and  in  a  moment  more  it  would  spring 
into  the  open  door. 

The  two  met  in  the  doorway ;  and  a  knife  flashed  down  in 
a  white  light.  Then,  laughing  his  scorn,  and  in  plain  sight 
of  the  three  men  that  watched  from  their  fields,  he  kicked 
the  bleeding  body  from  his  path. 

With  his  bag  over  his  shoulder,  he  started  running  toward 
the  hills.  One  of  the  Trotters'  herd  of  long-horned  cattle 
lifted  its  head  from  the  grass  as  he  passed,  and  he  fired 
remorselessly  at  its  shoulders.  It  rocked  down  with  a  bel- 
low; and  he  halted  to  drive  his  blade  into  its  neck. 

The  Trotters  were  firing  now,  impotently,  with  their 
pistols.  And  Abe  Carver  cursed  with  mad  rapture  when 
he  saw  them  spring  in  pursuit  of  him.  He  did  not  need 
the  sack  over  his  shoulder  as  a  decoy.  Once  having  seen 
the  butchery  of  the  steer  and  dog,  they  would  follow  him 
till  they  died. 

Just  as  he  had  hoped,  they  soon  swung  into  the  long,  easy 
trot  that  is  one  of  the  few  accomplishments  men  have  learned 
from  the  wild  creatures.  It  is  a  pace  that  will  run  down 
a  horse  in  time;  and  they  did  not  question  for  a  moment 


The  Serpent  City  253 

that  overtaking  Carver  was  but  the  work  of  an  hour  at 
most.    They  were  young  and  strong,  and  he  was  old. 

The  youngest  of  the  three  had  gone  to  the  cabin  after 
the  rifles;  now  he  had  joined  them  with  the  story  of  a 
fresh  atrocity.  And  the  three  of  them  trotted  together  up 
the  long  slope  in  pursuit  of  the  gray  figure  just  ahead. 

They  did  not  waste  their  pistol  cartridges  by  firing  at 
Carver.  A  pistol  is  not  particuly  accurate  at  long  distances, 
and  Carver  hovered  just  out  of  range.  They  would  catch 
him  soon,  anyway.  Besides,  a  murder  at  arm's-length  would 
better  satiate  their  fury. 

He  led  them  over  hills  and  down  into  still  glens  and 
around  the  shoulders  of  mountains  and  along  narrow  trails. 
He  was  trotting  slowly  now,  and  their  pace  had  decreased  too. 
As  danger  from  pistol  fire  grew  less,  he  had  permitted  the  dis- 
tance to  narrow  between  them.  Ever  he  moved  toward 
the  great  waste  of  crag  and  rock  heap  that  men  called  the 
Dead  Indian  Mountains.  And  ever  he  drew  his  three  pur- 
suers after  him. 

Now  he  was  traversing  the  great  range  itself.  The 
August  sun  blasted  down  in  fury,  and  the  rocks  swam  and 
shimmered  in  the  heat-waves.  It  was  the  most  torrid  hour 
of  the  day,  just  as  he  had  hoped. 

The  three  came  hot  on  the  trail,  for  surely  he  was  almost 
exhausted  now.  The  great  rock  heaps,  piled  as  if  in  the  play 
of  a  mad  god,  looked  down  at  this  strange  chase,  and  had 
never  seen  the  like  before. 

Now  Carver  was  ready  to  descend.  He  knew  the  country 
well.  A  thousand  times  he  had  crept  down  this  same 
precipice  of  shale, — a  steep  slope  that  ended  on  a  white  rock 
ledge  below.  There  was  no  retreat,  once  one  started  the 
descent.     Hand  and  knees  and  feet  were  needed  to  prevent 


254    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

a  fatal  fall,  and  only  by  the  most  tortuous  climbing  could 
one  ever  leave  the  white  ledge  below. 

He  dipped  down  and  down;  uttering  a  little  whispered 
call  that  was  more  nearly  like  the  hiss  of  a  snake  than  a 
human  cry, — the  friendship  articulation  of  the  poison  people. 

Literally  hundreds  of  the  lithe,  spotted  ribbons  of  gray 
were  sunning  themselves  on  the  rocks,  as  always  in  the 
heat  of  the  day.  Some  of  them  were  in  ghastly  masses,  and 
some  were  stretched  at  full  length.  It  was  the  great  colony 
of  rattlesnakes  that  Abe  Carver  had  known  of  old,  the 
great  assembly  of  poison  folk  whose  bite  is  death. 

They  could  not  see  him  now,  but  they  heard  his  call. 
The  rattlers  shed  their  skins  in  dog  days;  and  during  the 
period  they  become  temporarily  blind.  And  that  is  the 
time  that  all  creatures  most  carefully  avoid  the  snake  trails 
in  the  dust.  At  such  times  their  malignancy  is  at  its  height, 
and  they  strike  without  warning  at  the  slightest  movement 
on  the  stone. 

But  they  gave  no  heed  to  old  Abe  Carver.  They  were 
used  to  him,  and  to  their  own  whispered  friendship  call  that 
marked  him  as  a  brother  rather  than  a  foe.  He  climbed 
slowly  down,  his  face  and  hands  and  body  almost  brushing 
hundreds  of  the  terrible  flat  heads.  Then  he  dropped  his 
bag  and  sped  into  the  brush  beneath. 

And  just  as  he  had  known,  his  three  pursuers  plunged 
down  after  him. 

The  wild  is  very  old  and  most  imperturbable;  and  all 
except  its  own  soft  voices  are  always  quickly  stilled.  A  gray 
old  man  who  had  chattered  and  danced  in  rapture  stretched 
out  in  the  sun  to  sleep.  And  almost  as  quickly  as  the  ripples 
die  when  three  stones  are  cast  into  the  sea,  the  silence  fell 
again  over  the  serpent  city. 


BROTHER  BILL  THE  ELK 

The  bull  elk  bows  his  head  only  to  the  Manitou,  the  In- 
dians say;  and  one  has  to  look  rather  well,  and  quite  long, 
to  see  just  what  they  mean.  And  there  is  really  more  in 
it  than  appears  at  the  first  glance, — a  story  as  old  as  the 
hills. 

Of  course,  in  the  beginning,  it  refers  to  the  unquestioned 
majesty  of  that  great  monarch  of  the  deer.  No  camper  or 
forest  ranger  can  ever  catch  a  glimpse  of  him  at  the  drink- 
ing pool,  or  in  the  salt  lick,  or  engaged  in  those  furious 
battles  of  the  rutting  season  and  fail  to  observe  this  attribute. 
He  is  the  great  wapiti,  and  no  royal  stag  in  Scotland  can 
come  up  to  him  in  weight,  length  of  antler  or  power  of 
body.  He  isn't  as  large  as  the  European  elk — another  name 
for  America's  moose — but  the  latter  itsn't  a  true  stag,  and 
wapiti  is.  And  his  majesty  does  not  depend  on  looks  alone. 
Kingliness,  in  the  aristocracy  of  strength  of  the  forest,  is 
mainly  a  matter  of  fighting,  and  the  bull  elk  has  in  his 
front  feet  two  as  swift  and  as  deadly  incentives  to  obedience 
as  any  one  would  wish  to  feel.  That  gray  old  king,  the 
grizzly  bear,  could  never  in  his  best  days  be  called  a  beauty; 
but  when  one  has  seen  him  smash  down  a  bull  moose  with 
one  blow,  he  inspired  respect. 

Now  and  again  there  have  been  cougars  who  have  tried 
to  conquer  a  bull  elk  in  a  fair  fight,  but  only  the  buzzards 
benefited  by  the  occasion.  The  lashing  hoofs  and  slashing 
antlers  make  a  combination  that  a  wise  cougar  will  punc- 


256     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

tiliously  avoid.  The  only  way  one  of  the  great  cats  could 
hope  to  conquer  is  by  springing  from  ambush ;  and,  of  course, 
an  attack  from  the  shadows  may  occur  even  to  an  all-power- 
ful monarch. 

Such  things  as  coyotes  and  any  lone  wolves  as  can  be 
met  in  the  first  three  seasons  of  the  year  stay  out  of  the  bull 
elk's  path.  This  alone  is  enough  to  establish  his  degree. 
They  don't  like  his  hoofs  and  most  of  all,  they  don't  care 
for  the  uppercut  of  the  bayonet-pointed  antlers. 

But  this  is  only  half  the  story.  Granting  that  the  bull 
elk  is  the  forest  monarch,  many  days  of  wonder  and  many 
nights  beneath  the  stars  must  be  spent  before  the  full  truth 
of  the  Indian  saying  can  be  understood.  Perhaps  it  can't 
be  learned  at  all  in  spring,  when  the  birds  mate  two  by  two 
and  the  flowers  grow  in  the  new  grass;  or  in  summer,  when 
the  whole  forest  world  dozes  in  the  sun;  and  only  a  guess 
at  it  may  be  made  in  the  tingling,  frosty  dawns  of  fall.  But 
not  even  a  tenderfoot  can  remain  in  doubt  when  finally  the 
winter  breaks, — if  indeed  a  man  may  be  called  a  tenderfoot 
who  has  endured  the  mountain  winter. 

In  this  season — in  the  terrible  days  of  deepest  snow — the 
elk  stag  bows  his  head  at  last.  And  the  meaning  gleams 
through  the  mystery:  the  crown  falls — both  his  splendid 
antlers  drop  from  his  head.  Less  imaginative  but  more 
scientific  people  will  tell  you  that  the  elk  has  shed  his  horns, 
as  always  in  last  days  of  winter,  but  the  Indian  knows 
better.  It  is  obeisance  at  last, — not  to  any  living  creature 
that  might  contest  his  place,  but  to  the  Indian  god  of  all 
things,  Manitou  himself. 

Not  Manitou  in  the  flesh — such  sights  are  kept  only  for 
the  wisest  and  oldest  of  medicine  men — rather  it  is  the 
great  wastes  of  snow  with  which  Manitou  yearly  reminds 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  257 

the  forest  people  of  his  might.  For  one  season  alone,  the 
Indians  say,  all  the  forest  creatures  are  reminded  of  the 
Great  Spirit,  lest — like  certain  human  monarchs^ — they  be- 
come too  vain  and  proud.  And  the  people  prove  it  not  only 
by  the  dropping  of  the  monarch's  antlers,  but  by  the  way  the 
black  bears  hide  their  faces  in  the  snow,  and  the  mountain 
lions  slink  to  the  lower  foothills. 

All  things  are  humbled  in  the  winter,  and  starvation  and 
cold  and  death  are  familiar  spirits.  If  these  do  not  suffice, 
there  remain  the  wolves, — harmless  when  living  alone  or 
in  pairs  in  the  three  previous  seasons,  but  indomitable  when 
gathered  into  their  winter  packs.  They  are  not  just  forest 
hunters,  simply  living  organisms  to  be  repelled  with  hoof 
and  horn.  In  the  winter  they  seem  the  very  spirits  of  the 
snow,  of  the  unconquerable  cold  season.  Even  the  bull  elk, 
monarch  though  he  is,  must  flee  from  them — and  his  is  the 
story  of  the  war  they  waged  against  him,  jealous  of  his 
power,  in  the  land  of  sloughs  and  waterways  in  the  far  Cas- 
cades. 

Baby  Bill  opened  his  eyes  for  the  first  time  one  lovely 
day  in  late  spring.  Of  course  he  didn't  know  his  name  was 
Baby  Bill,  and  besides,  he  really  didn't  receive  the  name 
until  some  months  later.  Like  as  not,  the  great  bull  elk 
would  go  clear  through  life  without  exactly  understanding 
the  full  import  of  his  title.  He  was  born  in  a  little  glade 
in  the  Oregon  Cascades,  in  the  very  heart  of  that  great  for- 
est belt  from  which  cold  Eastern  people  expect  so  much 
in  the  way  of  lumber  and  fuel  in  years  to  come.  The  ma- 
ternity bed  was  a  little  mattress  of  leaves  and  pine  needles 
quite  hidden  away,  soft  and  springy  as  any  hair  mattress 
made  by  men. 


258     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

In  all  probability,  his  first  emotion  was  one  of  fear.  Prob- 
ably he  experienced  it  before  the  pangs  of  hunger,  and  that 
means  he  had  to  take  it  in  with  his  first  breath.  There  were 
shadows  lurking  beneath  the  heavy  foliage  of  the  distant 
thickets,  and  to  any  fawn  born  in  the  mountains,  shadows 
are  always  the  abiding  place  of  fear.  "Wait  till  thy  horns 
are  grown,"  perhaps  the  cow  told  him  as  his  lips  closed 
at  her  udder,  "and  then  thou  needst  not  be  so  tremulous 
of  every  shadow,  and  every  cracking  twig."  For  perhaps, 
mother-like,  the  cow  could  already  see  in  her  mind's  eye 
the  glory  that  was  to  be  if  her  little  bull  calf  could  reach 
maturity.  For  there  is  no  prouder  race  of  creatures  in  the 
whole  world  than  the  elk, — vain  of  their  beauty  and  strength 
and  antlers  flowing  back. 

Baby  Bill  was  very  frightened;  he  had  a  whole  range 
of  terrors,  one  for  every  hair  along  his  spine,  passed  down 
to  him  straight  from  the  young  days  of  the  earth.  He 
nestled  closer  to  his  mother's  warm  body.  No  man  may  tell 
what  his  keen  nose  read  in  the  faint  wind  that  came  blow- 
ing up  the  glen  and  pushing  and  whimpering  through  the 
thickets.  Of  course,  it  was  full  and  running  over  with  the 
multiple  odors  of  the  wild  places, — smells  wholly  incompre- 
hensible to  man  but  which  spoke  volumes  to  the  little  calf. 
Perhaps  he  knew  about  the  great  tawny  cat  that  slept  in 
the  covert  a  half-mile  up-wind:  a  creature  to  be  carefully 
avoided  if  Baby  Bill  were  ever  to  reach  maturity.  No 
bull  elk  fears  a  cougar  on  an  open  trail,  but  the  aggravating 
thing  about  Whisperfoot  is  that  the  open  trails  are  one 
place  where  he  does  not  go.  His  game  is  to  lie  in  ambush, 
so  close  to  the  yellow  leaves  that  not  even  the  eye  of  a  wild 
goose  can  detect  him,  and  to  leap  with  the  speed  of  a  ser- 
pent's dart  when  the  fawn  passes  on  the  trail. 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  259 

Baby  Bill,  however,  smelled  very  few  of  his  own  kind. 
The  elks,  even  fifteen  years  back,  were  no  longer  numerous 
in  the  Oregon  Cascades.  Their  teeth  had  been  too  val- 
uable to  wear  as  watch  charms,  and  their  heads  made  beau- 
tiful trophies  to  hang  above  buffets.  In  fact,  there  was  only 
one  small  herd,  numbering  about  fifteen,  ranging  the  whole 
section  of  the  lake  region.  It  had  neither  grown  nor  de- 
creased in  the  preceding  few  years,  the  birth  of  the  fawns 
barely  keeping  pace  with  the  mortalities  from  wild  crea- 
tures and  rifles.  At  that  moment,  led  by  a  magnificent  stag 
of  seven-tined  antlers,  the  little  herd  was  dozing  in  the 
spring  sunlight  a  quarter-mile  down-wind. 

The  doe  looked  at  her  baby  with  a  mother's  pride,  noting 
the  beautiful  coat,  the  intelligent,  startled  eyes,  the  long, 
slender  legs  and  the  well-built  body.  Not  often,  in  these 
later  days,  had  such  perfect  young  been  born.  She  licked 
his  burnished  skin  to  cleanse  it  of  its  film  of  dust. 

Scarcely  was  she  done  when  Baby  Bill  experienced  his 
first  real  adventure.  Graycoat,  remembered  of  old,  had 
caught  their  smell  in  the  wind;  and  he  was  always  quite 
interested  in  the  young  born  in  the  mountains.  There 
are  few  more  accomplished  stalkers  in  the  whole  wilderness 
world  than  Graycoat,  and  he  was  at  his  best,  for  his  own 
mate  had  a  litter  of  hungry  cubs  in  a  lair  in  a  distant  glen, 
and  much  fresh  meat  was  needed  to  supply  the  strong  milk 
for  their  ever-changing  tissue.  The  foliage  was  wet  from 
the  spring  rains  and  the  twigs  bent  beneath  his  step  without 
noise.  His  only  disadvantage  lay  in  the  fact  that  because 
of  the  cow's  foresight  in  choosing  the  maternity  bed,  he  was 
obliged  to  cross  a  little  stretch  of  comparatively  open  hill- 
side to  reach  the  covert  where  the  mother  elk  was  hidden. 

He  came  as  a  serpent  comes,  every  motion  stealing,  every 


260    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

foot  placed  with  infinite  care.  It  would  have  been  an  ex- 
ceedingly simple  matter  to  have  made  one  swift  dash  and 
overtaken  the  cow  and  calf ;  but  for  a  very  good  reason,  this 
was  farthest  from  Graycoat's  mind:  the  cow's  front  feet, 
the  hoof  of  each  being  as  deadly  a  weapon  as  a  forest  crea- 
ture cares  to  encounter.  Graycoat  had  no  intention  of 
waging  a  pitched  battle  with  an  infuriated  cow  elk.  Gray- 
coat's  plan  was  to  steal  up  close  and  make  a  surprise  attack 
on  the  fawn  before  the  cow  could  come  to  its  defense. 

At  that  instant,  with  a  motion  so  fast  the  little  calf  did 
not  even  have  time  to  be  frightened,  the  cow  leaped  to  her 
feet  with  a  bleat  of  anger.  She  had  seen  Graycoat's  steal- 
ing shadow  in  the  leaves. 

It  would  have  been  curious  to  observe  the  startling  econ- 
omy of  the  elk's  motions.  Just  before,  she  had  been  lying 
supinely  in  the  pine  needles,  rejoicing  in  her  calf,  and  tremu- 
lous with  that  mystery  of  motherhood  which  even  the  lower 
creatures  cannot  escape.  The  next  moment  she  stood  fully 
erect,  with  a  strange  rigidity  about  certain  muscles  in  the 
shoulders  and  the  thighs,  with  eyes  looking  straight  at  her 
foe,  with  head  somewhat  lowered,  in  a  perfect  position  for 
defense.  Seemingly  one  motion  alone  had  accomplished  the 
change. 

For  a  second  Graycoat  crouched.  It  might  be  that  the 
cow,  infuriated,  would  leap  from  the  bed  and  attempt  to 
attack  him, — a  plan  that  would  suit  Graycoat  to  a  nicety. 
Then  he  could  leap  to  one  side  and  slash  with  white  teeth 
at  the  fawn's  throat  before  the  cow  could  arrest  her  charge 
and  whirl  back  to  its  defense. 

Again  Graycoat  was  to  be  disappointed.  The  cow  stood 
motionless,  her  muscles  set  for  the  attack. 

Graycoat's  lips  drew  back  over  his  gleaming  teeth,  and 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  261 

he  snarled  his  disappointment.  It  is  a  fact  that  most  of 
the  larger  forest  creatures  receive  their  disappointments  with 
wretched  spirit.  There  is  no  more  distinctive  sound  in  the 
whole  Western  forest  life  than  the  yowl  of  a  timber  wolf 
which  has  missed  its  stroke.  He  means  it  to  be  very  ter- 
rible, but  to  Woof's  ears,  at  least,  it  is  only  funny,  for 
the  black  bear  has  notoriously  the  best  sense  of  humor  in 
the  forest.  But  Woof  himself  has  been  known  to  howl  dole- 
fully when  a  store  of  honey  is  beyond  his  reach.  And  now 
Graycoat  snarled  his  anger  that  the  elk  had  seen  his  ap- 
proach, and  had  leaped  to  her  son's  defense  in  time. 

Graycoat  made  a  slow  circuit  about  the  covert,  growling 
all  the  time.  But  the  reddened  eyes  of  the  elk  kept  pace 
with  him,  and  the  razor-edged  hoofs  were  kept  ready  to 
strike.  Nothing  remained  for  Graycoat  but  to  snarl  his 
insults  and  depart. 

Though  they  had  no  tongue  in  common,  the  elk  mother 
understood  the  full  meaning  of  those  snarls.  "Not  now," 
they  said.  "I  will  not  strike  now.  But  in  the  winter  when 
the  snows  are  deep,  then  will  thy  son  know  the  fangs  of 
Graycoat!  And  so  wilt  thou  and  all  thy  kind,  thou  un- 
gainly heifer!" 

Graycoat  was  implying  that  the  doe  was  not  a  wild  crea- 
ture at  all,  but  just  one  of  the  human-driven  cattle  that  the 
wild  creatures  often  encountered  and  which  they  held  in 
the  most  abject  scorn.  The  doe  snorted  in  answer ;  but  Gray- 
coat's  sharp  eyes  did  not  miss  the  little,  nervous  tremor  that 
flickered  at  her  flanks. 

Graycoat  stole  away;  but  he  left  the  doe  elk  quivering 
with  fright,  not  just  the  nervous  reaction  from  the  crisis 
of  the  moment  before.  She  had  been  frightened  then — 
frightened    for    her    calf   with    the    same    fear    which    is    a 


262     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

companion,  day  and  night,  to  any  female  deer — but  now  a 
strange  weight  of  dread  had  come  besides. 

The  reason  was  that  Graycoat  had  spoken  the  truth. 
In  winter,  when  the  crown  of  antlers  had  fallen  from  the 
head  of  the  bull-leader  of  the  herd,  Graycoat  would  come 
into  his  own.  He  was  only  to  be  scoffed  at  now,  a  killer 
of  rabbits,  and  a  hunter  of  fledgling  grouse.  Of  course  the 
little  blacktail  deer  had  to  fear  him,  timid,  ineffective  crea- 
tures that  they  were;  but  Woof  the  bear,  possibly  Whisper- 
foot  the  cougar  and  any  full-grown  specimen  of  her  own 
herd  could  drive  him  from  the  trail. 

In  spring,  summer  and  fall  there  was  only  one  name  for 
Graycoat:  coward.  These  three  seasons  would  not  last 
forever.  The  leaves  would  die  and  fall,  just  as  the  antlers 
fell  from  the  bull  elk,  and  the  snows  would  deepen  on  the 
plateaus.  For  Graycoat  was  a  great,  gaunt  timber  wolf; 
and  in  the  winter  he  and  all  his  brethren  would  gather  into 
a  pack;  and  not  even  the  bull  elk  can  avail  against  the  wolf 
pack  in  the  snow. 

Perhaps,  decreed  as  it  had  been  by  the  forest  gods,  there 
was  a  symbolic  significance  in  this  wolf  menace  on  the  first 
day  of  Baby  Bill's  life.  It  foretold  a  long  life  of  war- 
fare between  the  monarch  of  the  forest  and  the  terrors  of  the 
snow,  with  the  buzzard  triumphing  at  last. 

In  the  terms  of  the  old  language  of  venery,  Baby  Bill 
was  a  hind-calf  during  his  first  season.  After  the  first  week 
he  was  just  as  shy  of  danger,  and  almost  as  skilful  in  escap- 
ing it,  as  was  his  mother.  He  didn't  even  leave  his  birth- 
place. Unlike  marty  of  the  forest  creatures,  the  fawn  elk 
is  practically  helpless  during  the  first  few  days  of  its 
life.     But  after  a  week  had  passed,  his  slender  little  legs 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  263 

were  strong  enough  to  carry  him  anywhere  his  mother 
chose  to  lead  him. 

The  wilderness  world  unfolded  its  mysteries  for  him, 
day  by  day.  He  quickly  learned  to  interpret  the  wind's  mes- 
sages, smells  and  sounds  so  faint  that  no  human  senses  could 
possibly  perceive  them;  and  his  instincts  told  him  what  to 
do  in  each  case.  He  learned  how  to  steal  through  the  heavy 
thickets,  more  like  a  brown  shadow  than  a  living  thing; 
and  when  the  necessity  arose,  he  could  lie  so  still  and  close 
in  the  brush  that  the  sharpest  eye  could  not  detect  his  out- 
line. 

Sometimes  his  mother  followed  the  herd,  but  more  often 
she  and  her  son  kept  to  themselves.  Before  the  last  days 
of  August,  life  began  to  hold  all  manner  of  delights  for  him. 
He  liked  the  breathless  dawns  where  his  mother  grazed  on 
the  hillsides,  the  long,  sleepy  hours  of  midday,  and  the  stir 
and  thrill  of  the  descending  night.  He  enjoyed  the  occasional 
bath  he  and  his  mother  had  at  the  shores  of  the  long  sloughs 
extending  out  from  the  lakes. 

This  was  a  land  of  sloughs.  The  range  was  a  great  sweep 
of  territory  that  circles  Mount  McLaughlin ;  and  every  day's 
journey  took  them  to  the  shore  of  some  new,  shimmering 
lake.  Sometimes  it  was  Lake  of  the  Woods,  nestling  like  a 
great  sapphire  in  a  setting  of  evergreen ;  sometimes  they  went 
straight  east,  over  the  Cascades,  to  the  shores  of  the  Klamath 
Lakes.  There  is  no  more  mysterious  body  of  water  in  the 
whole  West  than  the  Upper  Klamath  Lake — said  to  be 
the  largest  fresh-water  body  west  of  the  Mississippi  River 
— but  only  on  rare  occasions  would  the  little  calf  get  a 
glimpse  of  it.  Most  of  the  margin  of  this  lake  consists  of 
wide,  brown  stretches  of  tule  and  wocus  marshes,  a  place 
beloved  by  the  water-fowl  but  where  the  heavy  feet  of  elk 


264     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

may  not  pass.  While  in  most  places  the  grass  roots  and 
a  shallow  covering  of  soil  are  substantial  enough  to  support 
a  heavy  foot,  there  are  plenty  of  inoffensive-looking  little 
pools  where  death  in  its  ugliest  form  is  always  waiting.  The 
water  is  only  a  few  inches  deep  and  the  quagmire  lies  beneath. 
Duck  hunters  have  now  and  then  tried  to  find  a  bottom 
to  these  places  with  the  ends  of  their  paddles,  and  there- 
after were  very  careful  to  see  that  they  did  not  fall  out 
of  their  boats.  There  have  been  times  when  a  whole  herd  of 
elk  perished  miserably,  hip-deep  in  muck,  before  finally  the 
buzzard  came  to  feast. 

There  were  a  few  places  such  as  Eagle  Ridge  and  the 
wooded  shores  of  Pelican  Bay  where  his  mother  might  lead 
him  in  safety,  although  she  stepped  carefully  even  here. 

In  their  wanderings  they  met  the  entire  animal  popula- 
tion of  the  Oregon  forests.  Sometimes  old  Woof,  the  black 
bear,  aroused  from  his  bad  dreams  in  the  brush  coverts, 
rose  up  with  his  characteristic  cry  and  startled  them,  yet 
not  even  the  little  blacktail  deer  were  afraid  of  Woof.  He 
was  a  berry  eater,  not  a  hunter  of  meat,  and  his  cross  dis- 
position is  a  legend  merely.  They  saw  the  lynx  that  always 
looked  hungrily  at  the  little  hind  calf,  but  never  dared 
attack;  the  porcupine,  grunting  on  the  hillside  and  trying 
with  stupid  senses  to  get  some  meaning  out  of  life;  and 
those  inglorious  cowards,  the  coyotes,  weeping  and  wailing 
in  the  twilights.  They  knew  also  the  chipmunks  that  like 
to  lie  still  and  pretend  they  are  dead  leaves  in  the  gnarled, 
uncovered  roots  of  a  tree;  the  gray  squirrels  that  work  all 
fall  to  put  away  their  stores  of  acorns;  the  snowshoe  rab- 
bits; and,  of  course,  their  own  lesser  cousins,  the  deer.  They 
knew  what  it  was  to  see  the  hen  mallard  swim  away  with 
her   flock   when   they  came   down   to   the   water's  edge   to 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  265 

drink,  and  more  than  once  they  were  startled  by  the  roar  of 
the  wild  geese's  wings  on  the  lake  shore. 

One  night,  when  summer  was  quite  done,  they  encountered 
Whisperfoot.  Although  he  did  not  know  it — for  not  even 
human  insight  can  foresee  the  unfolding  of  events — it  was 
one  of  the  few  real  epochs  of  Baby  Bill's  life. 

He  had  grown  bolder  with  the  passing  months,  and  late 
one  afternoon  was  exploring  a  hillside,  quite  a  long  way 
from  the  brushy  covert  where  his  mother  was  lying  down. 
The  air  was  crisp  with  the  chill  of  early  fall,  instilling  new 
energy  in  the  fawn's  blood.  He  was  giving  no  thought  to 
danger;  Tather,  he  was  quite  eaten  up  with  curiosity  as  to 
what  had  become  of  the  green  leaves  that  used  to  catch  his 
eye  with  their  shimmer  in  the  sunlight.  Seemingly  they 
had  all  gone,  or  turned  to  the  color  of  the  marsh  grass.  He 
didn't  know  that  the  fall  frost  had  already  seared  them. 
He  had  been  only  dimly  aware  that  the  days  had  steadily 
shortened  as  the  flowers  had  perished;  and  he  was  really 
surprised  when  the  sun  dropped  suddenly  down  behind  a  dis- 
tant mountain. 

His  feeling  of  security  and  comfort  deserted  him.  Sunset, 
to  the  wild  creatures,  means  something  entirely  different 
than  to  human  beings.  With  the  latter,  it  is  a  glorious 
view  of  red  clouds  in  the  West  and  the  realization  that 
it  will  soon  be  dinner  time.  But  sunset  to  the  forest  folk 
means  the  sudden  shadow  of  the  wings  of  danger.  For  cer- 
tain reasons  of  his  own,  Baby  Bill  did  not  like  to  be  alone 
on  the  hillside  when  twilight  fell. 

At  this  hour  too  many  mountain  lions  yawned  in  their 
lairs,  and  went  out  with  pale-blue  eyes  to  hunt.  Too  many 
lynx  crept  through  the  tree  limbs,  and  too  many  wolves 
came  stealing  through  the  underbrush.     It  was  the  hour  of 


266    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

triumph  for  the  hunting  creatures.  Moreover,  there  is 
seemingly  no  pause  between  sunset  and  twilight.  Unlike 
the  plains,  the  long  shadows  seem  to  descend  with  startling 
swiftness.  The  sky  turns  green;  the  dusk  grows  between 
the   distant    tree-trunks. 

For  an  instant  the  fawn  stood  still,  sniffing.  There  were 
two  menacing  smells  in  the  air,  one  entirely  new;  it  was 
so  startlingly  pungent,  for  a  moment  his  senses  did  not  fully 
perceive  the  other.  When  they  did,  he  sank  down  in  the 
dead  leaves. 

He  knew  this  smell,  even  half-effaced  as  it  was  with 
the  new  one  that  seemed  to  come  down  from  the  hillside  just 
above  him.  It  was  the  wild,  heart-freezing  odor  of  a  cougar, 
so  familiar  in  the  short  months  of  his  life.  He  hadn't  had 
to  be  taught  its  menace.  Many  little  voices  inside  of  him, 
many  little  quivers  of  his  skin,  told  him  all  about  it.  For 
ever  and  ever  his  breed  had  known  the  great  felines, — from 
the  first  day  his  broad-horned  ancestors  had  fled  from  the 
saber-tooths  in  the  young  days  of  the  world. 

His  little  body  did  not  seem  to  move.  One  of  the  first 
laws  of  the  forest  is  to  learn  to  lie  without  a  twitch  of  an 
ear  or  the  movement  of  a  hair,  for  motion,  not  outline,  is 
most  clearly  visible  to  the  eyes  of  the  hunting  creatures. 
Outline,  through  the  beneficence  of  Nature,  usually  is 
blended  and  lost  in  the  light  and  shadow  of  the  under  foliage, 
but  the  slightest  motion  is  instantly  detected. 

Baby  Bill  had  learned  this  lesson  long  ago,  if  instinct  had 
not  whispered  it  when  he  yet  dwelt  in  his  mother's  womb; 
and  he  was  relying  on  it  now.  His  only  motion  was  a 
slow,  almost  imperceptible  movement  of  his  eyeballs  in 
an  effort  to  catch  a  glimpse  of  his  foe.  He  had  quite  for- 
gotten the  new,  pungent  smell. 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  267 

In  an  instant  he  was  quite  sure  that  no  cougar  was  near. 
It  was  still  light  enough  to  see  plainly,  and  on  the  half- 
open  hillside,  surely  none  of  the  great  cats  could  escape 
his  gaze.  Yet  he  was  dimly  uncomfortable  from  the 
pungency  of  the  smell.  Now,  as  he  waited,  it  weakened 
and  died  out. 

But  the  cougar  was  very  near  indeed.  The  little  fawn 
could  not  see  him  because  the  foliage  had  recently  turned 
yellow  from  frost,  making  a  perfect  background  for  the 
cougar's  tawny  body.  This  was  the  most  perilous  moment 
of  Baby  Bill's  life. 

The  great  cat,  who  had  survived  many  a  fall  season 
and  could  see  straight  through  the  yellow  leaves,  had  already 
seen  the  fawn.  It  had  been  drowsy  the  moment  before  from 
its  afternoon  nap.  Now  the  languor  in  its  eyes  had  given 
way  to  a  curious  blue  fire.  It  made  a  half  circle  to  get 
down-wind  from  the  fawn.  So  absorbed  was  it  by  the  mad- 
ness of  the  hunt  that  it  quite  failed  to  detect  what  even 
the  blunt  nose  of  a  feline  might  otherwise  have  caught, — 
this  new,  pungent  odor  coming  down  from  the  hillside. 

The  cougar  began  to  advance,  cautiously  at  first.  It 
meant  to  come  as  close  as  it  could,  taking  advantage  of 
the  tawny  foliage,  and  then  overtake  the  fawn  in  a  short 
chase.  The  wild  heart  leaped.  The  mother  elk  was  ab- 
sent, and  there  seemed  no  possibility  of  the  calf's  escape. 

Then,  looming  with  startling  distinctness  in  the  shrub- 
bery, Baby  Bill  perceived  the  cougar.  His  instincts  were 
entirely  true.  He  knew  that  the  great  cat  had  discovered 
his  hiding  place  and  was  even  now  bearing  down  upon 
him.  With  a  bleat  of  terror,  he  leaped  up  and  sped  away 
down  the  hillside  toward  his  mother. 

By  no  mercy  of  the   forest  gods  could   the  fawn  have 


268     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

escaped,  if  it  had  not  been  for  an  entirely  unlooked-for  in- 
terference of  a  spectator  from  the  hill.  The  distance  was 
far,  and  although  the  fawn  was  swift,  the  cougar  could 
have  overtaken  him  within  a  dozen  leaps.  However,  there 
is  one  thing  in  the  material  world  even  swifter  than  the 
leap  of  a  cougar,  faster  than  the  flight  of  a  teal  or  the  dart 
of  a  serpent's  head:  a  little  fraction  of  an  ounce  of  lead 
and  steel  in  the  brass  rifle  shells  that  a  certain  naturalist, 
known  far  and  wide  throughout  the  lake  region,  wore  in 
his  belt. 

Nathan  Funk  was  gray-haired,  and  he  had  seen  many 
winters;  but  his  eye  could  still  look  sure  and  straight 
along  the  barrel  of  his  rifle.  His  hand  was  rather  gray 
from  advancing  years,  but  nis  finger  could  press  back  true 
and  steady  against  a  trigger.  He  knew  all  about  cougars. 
He  was  familiar  with  the  astounding  casualties  they  in- 
flict yearly  on  the  various  families  of  the  deer,  and  he  had 
no  love  for  them.  Besides,  he  was  particularly  interested 
in  the  survival  of  the  little  herd  of  elk  that  still  ranged 
the  forests  of  his  home. 

He  had  been  sitting  almost  out  of  sight  on  the  hill, 
watching  with  delighted  eyes  the  explorations  of  the  elk 
fawn.  He  hadn't  been  able  to  understand  why  it  had 
suddenly  crouched,  in  such  evident  terror,  in  the  thickets. 
No  Indian  had  a  keener  nose  than  Funk,  yet  he  had  been 
wholly  ignorant  of  the  presence  of  the  mountain  lion  creep- 
ing through  the  shrubbery  toward  the  fawn.  He  didn't  see 
the  animal  until  it  leaped. 

There  was  scarcely  time  for  aim.  The  gun  shocked  back 
against  his  shoulder,  and  seemingly  no  effort  or  time  had 
been  expended  in  getting  it  here.    The  finger  closed  against 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  269 

the  trigger,  and  the  still  mountain  air  seemed  to  shudder 
from  the  report. 

It  was  a  clean,  true  shot,  catching  the  great  cat  in  mid- 
spring;  and  the  cougar  was  dead  before  he  hit  the  ground. 
The  fawn  dived  into  the  heavy  brush,  then  started  to  turn 
up  the  hill  again.  He  made  a  wide  detour  to  avoid  the 
cougar's  body,  giving  Nathan  Funk  time  to  hasten  down 
the  hill  and  cut  off  the  fawn's  retreat.  There,  both  rather 
tremulous  from  the  crisis  of  the  moment  before,  Nathan 
Funk  and  Baby  Bill  met  for  the  first  time. 

The  fawn  drew  up  to  a  sliding  halt,  forty  feet  distant 
from  the  man.  For  an  instant  the  gray  frontiersman  stood 
laughing  into  its  face. 

"Why,  you  scared  little  devil!"  he  called.  "You  little, 
long-legged  brainless!    Why  aren't  you  with  your  mother?" 

The  calf  bleated  and  sped  hastily  away.  But  the  moment 
gave  Nathan  time  to  mark  the  well-built  body,  the  sturdy 
legs,  the  promise  of  greatness  in  the  head  and  flanks.  All 
at  once  his  bright  eyes  grew  quiet.  Here  was  a  bull  elk 
which,  if  protected,  might  easily  become  the  monarch  of 
all  the  forest. 

Years  before,  when  Nathan  lived  in  the  villages  of  men, 
he  had  belonged  to  a  great  American  fraternal  order  of  which 
the  elk  (or  the  wapiti,  as  he  is  more  scientifically  known) 
is  the  emblem  and  the  basis  of  the  name.  It  was  the  custom, 
in  that  order,  to  speak  of  the  newly  initiated  as  Baby  Elks, — 
and  he  remembered  also  it  was  part  of  the  free,  good  humor 
of  the  body  to  address  fellow  members  as  "Bill."  Partly 
because  of  a  sense  of  humor  that  the  dark  hills  had  never 
killed,  and  partly  as  a  kindly  whim  of  a  wise  naturalist  who 
had  established  brotherhood  with  the  forest  creatures,  he 
seized  upon  this  old  appellation  for  the  calf's  name. 


270    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

"Baby  Bill,"  he  said— and  laughed.  "Baby  Bill— if  you 
just  keep  up  your  present  rate  of  growth,  you're  going  to 
be  the  Grand  Exalted  Ruler  of  this  whole  region,  one  of 
these  fine  days." 

After  the  rutting  season  Baby  Bill  was  left  to  his  own 
devices.  At  first  there  were  many  nights  of  terror  when 
the  wind  mourned  in  the  pines  and  the  storm  clouds  of 
late  fall  hid  the  moon  and  stars.  But  he  was  a  swift  little 
elk  by  now;  no  cougar  could  overtake  him  in  a  straight- 
out  race.  And  Baby  Bill  was  equipped  with  a  large  num- 
ber of  extra-keen  senses  that  made  it  very  hard  for  Whisper- 
foot  to  effect  a  stalk. 

The  fall  rains  changed  to  snow,  and  Baby  Bill  followed 
his  herd  down  to  the  lower  levels.  He  really  didn't  care 
to  grub  his  food  through  the  six  feet  of  snow  that  covered 
the  high  plateaus.  Besides,  his  old  enemies,  the  wolf  pack 
— afraid  of  the  frontiersman  who  lived  in  the  lower  hills — 
kept  a  grim  watch  over  the  snow  fields.  The  only  un- 
pleasant circumstance  connected  with  the  descent  lay  in  the 
fact  that  many  of  these  mountain  ranchers  were  almost 
as  dangerous  foes  as  the  wolves.  Unlike  old  Nathan  Funk, 
they  had  no  scruples  against  killing  the  last  of  the  elk. 

But  spring  came  at  last,  and  then  a  long,  glorious  sum- 
mer. Baby  Bill  thought  he  must  be  a  full-grown  buck 
by  now,  and  he  proved  it  by  a  pair  of  long,  sharp  spikes, 
of  which  he  was  immensely  proud.  He  was  already  larger 
than  most  of  the  blacktail  deer.  Slowly  he  began  to  learn 
that  except  for  the  wolf  pack  and  the  human  hunters  with 
guns,  he  could  make  his  own  way  in  the  lake  region. 

He  was  a  swift  runner,  and  the  dangers  of  his  youth 
had  taught  him  always  to  be  on  the  alert.  He  had  only 
scorn  for  the  lynx  which  looked  after  him  with  such  hungry 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  271 

speculations  in  their  wild,  green  eyes.  And  Woof — once 
in  his  third  year,  when  his  spikes  had  fallen  and  grown 
again  to  forked  horns — treated  him  with  considerable  re- 
spect in  a  chance  meeting  on  the  hillside.  Nothing  could 
be  more  flattering  than  this.  The  most  intellectual  animal 
in  the  Oregon  woods — lacking,  of  course,  in  the  cunning 
of  the  wolves — Woof  usually  knew  just  who  was  who,  and 
what  creatures  it  was  best  and  wisest  to  treat  with  polite- 
ness. And  ever  since  the  bull  elk  who  led  the  herd  had 
accused  him  of  having  unseemly  intentions  toward  one  of 
the  hind  calves,  and  had  landed  with  both  front  feet  on 
Woof's  furry  sides,  the  old  black  bear  had  always  had  a 
courteous  word  for  all  the  males  of  the  species! 

This  was  living:  to  wake  from  the  long  slumber  of 
the  afternoons,  to  steal  up  the  hillsides,  to  snort  defiance 
to  the  lynx  and  coyote  and  to  know  the  wild  excitement 
of  the  hunting  hour.  He  liked  to  make  swift  dips  into  the 
glens — perhaps  to  a  salt  lick  or  a  water  pool — and  now 
and  then  he  enjoyed  running  about,  half  the  night,  with 
no  particular  destination  in  view.  His  strength  grew  with 
every  day.    His  muscles  hardened,  and  his  frame  was  mighty. 

Sometimes  he  had  half-angry  combats  with  the  young 
males  of  his  own  age — there  were  half  a  dozen,  perhaps, 
who  had  survived  the  winter — and  he  learned  a  certain  skill 
with  the  weapons  Nature  had  given  him.  Another  year, 
and  he  became  increasingly  careless  as  to  the  size  and 
age  of  the  bulls  he  combated.  Deep  down  in  his  heart — 
or  wherever  the  bull  elk  has  such  impulses — he  began  secretly 
to  dream  of  fighting  the  great  bull  leader  himself. 

Of  course,  he  was  not  aware  of  the  watch  Nathan  Funk 
kept  over  him.  True,  he  caught  far-off  glimpses  of  the  man 
sometimes.     But  as  Funk  was  the  only  human  being  who 


272     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

lived  in  that  part  of  the  range,  he  had  no  opportunity 
to  become  used  to  the  sight  of  these  strange,  forked  crea- 
tures.    However,  he  did  fear  them. 

"Most  of  all,  fear  men,"  is  an  old  law  in  the  forest, 
and  as  the  years  passed  Baby  Bill  began  to  see  the  wis- 
dom of  it.  There  seemed  to  be  one  stretch  of  range,  be- 
tween Lake  of  the  Woods  and  the  eastern  lakes,  where 
the  herd  could  roam  in  safety.  True,  Nathan  Funk  had 
his  cabin  there,  but  the  strange  thing  that  glittered  always 
in  his  hands  did  not  speak  death  as  in  the  case  of  the 
frontiersmen  at  the  other  side  of  the  range.  The  creatures 
of  the  wild  are  exceedingly  stupid  about  some  things,  but 
few  indeed  did  not  know  of  the  deadliness  of  men  and  rifles. 

This  little  band  of  elk  particularly  had  learned  the  les- 
son long  ago.  It  could  not  seem  to  gain.  Every  year  the 
does  brought  forth  their  young,  but  by  the  end  of  the  first 
season,  half  of  them  were  gone.  Some  were  killed  by  the 
cougars,  and  natural  disasters — cold  and  breaking  ice  and 
hunger — accounted  for  many  more.  All  through  the  sea- 
sons that  followed  there  were  constant  casualties.  The  rifles 
of  men  spoke  pitilessly  from  the  brush  coverts,  from  plat- 
forms built  over  the  deer  licks.  With  the  coming  of  the 
snow  wolves  always  remained. 

There  was  but  one  pack,  made  up  of  all  the  individuals 
in  the  immediate  region;  but  their  track  was  wide.  Each 
winter  they  swept  the  uplands  clean.  A  mountain  lion 
quite  often  misses  its  stroke,  as  does  any  hunting  creature 
which  depends  upon  a  surprise  attack  and  a  single,  death- 
dealing  blow.  But  when  once  the  wolf  pack  finds  the  trail 
of  game,  death  always  waits  at  the  end  of  it.  In  the  late 
winter,  the  starving  time  in  the  mountain  realm,  even  the 
lakes  and  rivers  that  might  obliterate  a  track  are  frozen. 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  273 

So  far  Baby  Bill  had  escaped,  and  when  he  had  reached 
his  seventh  year,  there  was  no  more  magnificent  animal 
in  the  whole  Oregon  forest  than  he.  He  was  full-grown; 
his  strength  was  at  its  height;  he  knew  the  last  refinements 
in  the  use  of  hoof  and  antler.  Whisperfoot  crept  from 
his  trail  when  he  heard  his  step.  Nathan  Funk  marvelled 
from  afar  at  the  development  of  muscle,  the  beauty  of  antler 
and  coat,  the  stately  carriage.  Except  for  the  wolf  pack, 
there  was  but  one  forest  power  that  he  had  not  yet  mas- 
tered: the  great  bull  leader  of  the  herd. 

The  leaves  died  and  littered  the  ground,  and  the  last 
of  the  velvet  was  rubbed  from  Baby  Bill's  horns.  Late  one 
afternoon,  when  the  sky  was  full  of  southern-flying  water- 
fowl, he  awakened  from  a  nap  in  the  buckbrush  to  sense 
a  new  stir  and  impulse  in  the  air.  He  didn't  understand 
at  first.  He  felt  restless  and,  in  some  vague  way,  half- 
angry.  He  had  lain  down  with  perfect  complacency  some 
hours  before.  Evidently  the  wings  of  the  waterfowl  had 
brought  some  change,  a  new  essence  and  magic  in  the  air. 

These  had  been  great  days.  He  had  lived  the  life  of 
a  forest  monarch,  fearing  no  trails  except  the  trail  of  men, 
sleeping  and  feeding  at  will,  bathing  in  the  long,  still,  dusky 
sloughs,  reveling  in  the  crisp  dawns  and  the  mysterious  nights, 
running  to  exhaustion  over  the  ridges.  He  had  felt  no  need 
of  the  protection  of  the  herd.  The  snows,  when  the  wolves 
must  be  considered,  were  yet  far  distant.  Now,  in  a  mo- 
ment, all  was  changed.  He  tried  to  go  to  his  feeding — 
that  tremulous  advance  over  the  grass-covered  hillsides — but 
the  tender  herbage  was  dry  as  dust  in  his  mouth.  There 
were  vague  promptings  in  his  blood  he  could  not  understand, 
a  strange  loneliness  that  gave  way  to  an  actual  sense  of 
excitement. 


274    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

It  must  be  confessed  that  Baby  Bill  had  no  memory 
to  speak  of  at  all.  Otherwise  he  could  have  remembered 
another  crisp  evening,  just  a  year  before,  when  the  same 
uneasiness  had  come  upon  him,  and  thus  recognized  the 
symptoms.  If  he  could  have  looked  back  two  years,  he 
could  have  remembered  it  again.  The  ruminants  have  no- 
toriously more  beauty  than  brains;  and  even  Woof,  famously 
forgetful,  would  have  been  ashamed  of  any  such  loss  of 
memory  as  this.  The  explanation  of  his  uneasiness  was 
really  very  simple :  it  was  the  beginning  of  the  rutting  season. 

Suddenly  he  remembered  the  herd,  the  trim  females,  that 
followed  the  great  bull  leader.  Like  the  wind,  he  headed 
across  the  ridge  toward  it.  No  man  can  say  how  he  knew 
the  direction.  It  seemed  far  too  distant  for  the  wind  to 
carry  a  scent;  yet  he  went  straight,  as  the  bee  goes  with 
her  load  of  honey. 

He  did  not  recall  that  just  a  year  before  he  had  raced 
across  the  ridges  to  join  the  herd.  Possibly  it  was  just 
as  well,  for  on  that  occasion,  the  great  bull  leader  had  been 
waiting  for  him,  and  they  had  fought  a  long  time  in 
an  old  burn  on  the  hillside.  It  had  been  a  very  painful 
and  disagreeable  experience.  After  a  fight  that  had  taxed 
the  last  ounce  of  the  leader's  strength,  Baby  Bill  had  been 
beaten  off.  Wounded  and  bleeding  and  exhausted,  all  his 
amor  for  the  trim  females  had  been  knocked  out  of  him. 

Of  course,  the  herd  leader  would  be  waiting  again,  but 
Baby  Bill  did  not  give  him  a  thought.  As  long  as  a 
patriarch  is  able  to  defeat  all  contestants  for  his  place,  he 
does  not  divide  his  harem  with  lesser  bulls.  The  great 
elk  headed  down  the  ridges,  his  horns  lowered  to  his  shoul- 
ders, the  thickets  giving  way  before  him.  He  made  no 
effort  to  go  silently.     He  cared  not  at  all  for  the  wolf  pack 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  275 

that  would  soon  be  gathering.  A  large  cougar  heard  him 
coming  when  he  was  still  a  great  distance  off,  but  very 
wisely  turned  from  the  trail.  For  once  old  Woof,  who 
in  his  pride  does  not  like  to  give  way  to  any  living  creature 
in  the  forest,  pretended  he  had  business  that  took  him  off 
the  trail  into  the  berry  thickets.  And  most  portentous 
of  all,  Baby  Bill  even  forgot  the  existence  of  his  arch-enemy, 
man;  he  would  almost  have  run  over  any  human  hunters 
that  might  have  been  in  his  path. 

When  he  got  within  one  hundred  yards  of  the  herd,  he 
slackened  his  pace  to  a  stately  walk.  He  had  no  intention 
of  compromising  his  dignity  by  rushing  up  to  the  herd  in  a 
frenzied  run.  The  dignity  of  the  larger  forest  creatures 
is  very  dear  to  them,  and  there  are  no  more  arrogant  show- 
offs  in  the  whole  forest  world  than  the  elks.  It  was  the 
same  instinct  that  makes  a  human  wooer  stop  to  arrange 
his  tie  before  he  rings  the  doorbell.  Baby  Bill  wanted  to 
make  his  appearance  just  as  glorious  and  stately  as  possible. 
With  antlers  thrown  back  at  the  most  becoming  attitude, 
with  nose  lifted,  and  stepping  grandly,  he  strode  down  to- 
ward the  herd. 

The  does  seemed  to  be  waiting  for  him  in  a  little  green 
glen  beside  a  spring.  The  glory  of  fall  was  over  the  for- 
est world.  The  leaves  were  scarlet  and  yellow,  the  sky  was 
seer,  the  wild  geese  called  from  the  clouds.  The  herd 
thrilled  as  he  came.  The  great  herd  leader  snorted  his  de- 
fiance. 

It  was  a  peculiar  sound,  hard  to  imitate, — a  sort  of  escap- 
ing-steam  explosion,  beginning  with  a  high,  whistling  snort 
and  descending  to  a  bovine-like  bawl.  It  was  the  challenge, 
never  to  be  forgotten.  He  saw  the  trim  cows,  their  specu- 
lative eyes,  and  the  blood  seemed  to  heat  and  leap  in  his 


276    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

veins.  Wholly  without  conscious  design,  he  found  himself 
replying  to  the  challenge. 

Then  the  great  bull  rushed  him.  There  were  none  of 
the  formalities  such  as  precede  a  battle  between  bull  ele- 
phants in  India  or  the  old-time  conflicts  of  the  bison  on 
the  plains.  He  simply  charged, — without  a  second's  pause. 
For  long  years  he  had  ruled  the  herd,  and  he  had  no  in- 
tention of  yielding  his  leadership  or  part  of  his  harem  to 
this  arrogant  seven-year-old.  The  eyes  flamed,  a  snort  of 
wrath  carried  far  through  the  silences  between  the  tree 
trunks,  and  the  magnificent  head  lowered. 

The  two  bulls  met  with  a  resounding  shock.  But  the 
herd  leader  had  gathered  a  tremendous  momentum  in  his 
long  run,  and  the  same  thing  happened  that  occurs  wThen  a 
runaway  train  strikes  a  passenger  coach  standing  on  a  side 
rail:  Baby  Bill  was  knocked  heels  over  head,  off  his  feet 
and  prone  in  the  pine  needles. 

The  herd  leader  had  every  right  to  think  the  fight  should 
have  ended  at  this  point.  What  followed  was  a  distinctly 
unpleasant  surprise.  He  had  rushed  over  to  the  fallen  elk 
to  administer,  at  his  leisure,  a  few  finishing  touches  that 
might  teach  Baby  Bill  his  place.  Of  course,  they  might 
kill  him;  if  they  did,  it  wouldn't  much  matter.  Any- 
way, they  would  show  him  the  folly  of  interfering  in  other 
men's  families.  He  supposed  that  all  resistance  was  com- 
pletely knocked  out  of  the  fallen  bull. 

With  an  agility  wholly  unsuspected  in  so  vast  a  creature, 
Baby  Bill  got  his  legs  under  him  and  leaped.  An  instant 
before  he  had  seemed  quite  helpless.  The  next,  he  came 
lunging  up  like  a  torpedo  out  of  the  sea, — with  the  power 
of  his  great  flanks  behind  him.  It  was  a  rather  startling 
instance  of  a  "come-back."     The  only  possible  explanation 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  277 

was  that  Baby  Bill  had  muscular  development  and  agility 
superior  to  any  other  bull  elk  of  his  time.  He  lunged 
with  tremendous  force,  and  his  horns  caught  the  herd  leader 
in  the  tender  realm  beneath  his  chin. 

Then  the  battle  began  in  earnest.  This  was  no  ordinary 
fight,  such  as  the  herd  leader  was  wont  to  wage  with  the 
two  and  three-year-old  bulls  for  the  amusement  and  edifica- 
tion of  his  cows.  For  once  he  had  met  an  opponent  worthy 
of  his  antlers!  This  was  no  cougar,  to  be  slashed  into  fur 
patches  with  his  front  hoofs;  no  coyote,  to  flee  from  the 
trail.  Baby  Bill  also  recognized  the  encounter  as  something 
far  different  from  the  fights  of  his  fawnhood.  The  herd 
leader  had  engaged  in  many  battles;  he  was  a  magnificent 
example  of  the  breed,  and  he  knew  the  fighting  game  from 
handshake  to  gong. 

A  fight  between  bull  elks  is  usually  a  swift  affair.  With 
such  weapons  as  the  multiple-bladed  daggers  they  wore  on 
their  heads  and  their  sharp-edged  front  feet,  casualties  hap- 
pen swiftly.  But  the  two  bulls  were  remarkably  evenly 
matched  in  this  battle.  The  sunset  glamor  had  died  on  the 
high  peaks  without  either  gaining  an  edge. 

Their  horns  clicked,  and  now  and  then  one  would  see 
an  opportunity  to  administer  a  lashing,  cutting  blow  with 
the  front  feet.  Their  hides  were  no  longer  glossy  and 
smooth ;  their  nostrils  were  red ;  their  eyes  glowed  in  the  half- 
darkness.  The  cows  milled  uneasily;  the  sound  of  combat 
carried  far. 

Then  Baby  Bill  effected  as  clever  a  piece  of  maneuvering 
as  the  great  pines,  which  have  seen  more  battles  than  most 
people  would  care  to  count,  had  ever  beheld.  Usually  the 
elk  does  not  show  any  particular  craft  in  his  battles.  They 
are  affairs  of  main  strength  and  agility, — driving,  thrust- 


278     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

ing,  lashing  in  when  an  opening  comes,  recoiling  to  lash 
again.  The  elk  is  not  an  intellectual  animal;  but  the  strat- 
egy that  Baby  Bill  effected  would  have  done  credit  to 
Woof  or  Graycoat. 

He  managed,  wholly  unsuspected  by  the  herd  leader,  to 
circle  about  and  get  his  opponent  between  two  great, 
converging  dead  trunks  of  trees.  Then  he  began  to  force 
him  back  into  the  little  corner  where  the  trunks  crossed. 
When  the  herd  leader  was  so  cramped  for  room  that  he 
could  not  recoil  or  strike,  before  he  could  break  his  way  out, 
Baby  Bill  lunged  at  him. 

In  the  half-shadows,  the  cows  could  scarcely  see  just 
what  occurred.  Besides,  it  was  almost  too  swift  for  the  eye 
to  follow.  The  herd  leader  went  down,  and  Baby  Bill's 
front  hoofs  lashed  at  him  again  and  again.  Then,  be- 
cause the  herd  leader  lay  still,  he  lowered  his  head  to  finish 
the  work. 

He  struck  just  once,  a  lashing  blow  in  which  tine  clicked 
against  tine.  He  started  to  draw  back  to  strike  again;  but 
instead  of  the  bleat  of  surrender  and  the  snort  of  triumph, 
the  waiting  does  heard  only  a  curious,  frenzied  thrashing 
in  the  half-shadows.  It  increased  to  a  thunderous  uproar. 
A  panic  passed  as  if  by  wings  from  one  of  the  cows  to  an- 
other. They  darted  away  in  terror.  Then,  because  exhaus- 
tion had  come,  the  sound  was  slowly  quieted.  The  two 
great  elk  lay  quietly,  head  to  head ;  their  great  horns  had  be- 
come interlocked  in  the  final  second  of  battle  and  could  not 
be  broken  apart. 

Old  Nathan  Funk  had  seen  many  winters,  but  their 
fogs  had  never  got  into  his  eyes.  He  still  had  remarkable 
powers  of  vision.     In  some  ways,  it  was  ever  surer  than  in 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  279 

his  youth.  Time  was  when  he  had  shot  at  an  upright  stump 
across  a  thousand  yards  of  chasm,  thinking  it  was  a  deer; 
but  these  times  were  passed.  He  knew  the  mountains  now, 
■ — their  light  and  shadow,  the  variation  of  foliage,  and  he 
was  well  acquainted  with  the  tricks  they  could  play  upon  the 
vision.  Natural  camouflage — the  tawny  coloring  of  a  cougar 
or  the  stripes  of  a  chipmunk — could  no  longer  avail  against 
him.  Naturalist  that  he  was,  he  had  trained  his  eyes  to 
detect  instantly  the  outline  of  any  living  creature  in  his 
vicinity. 

One  late  fall  day,  when  he  passed  on  the  hillside  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  above  a  curious  little  glen  beside  a  spring, 
his  careless  gaze  was  suddenly  arrested  by  a  curious,  brown 
shadow  among  the  fallen  tree  trunks.  No  tenderfoot  could 
have  seen  as  much.  A  field  glass  could  have  moved  across 
the  glen  without  revealing  it.  His  eye  caught  and  rested 
upon  it  through  no  conscious  intent  of  his  own. 

For  an  instant  he  was  puzzled.  It  was  not  a  deer,  feed- 
ing in  the  soft  grass  of  the  ravine !  And  it  was  far  too  large 
for  the  prone  body  of  either  a  deer  or  a  bear ! 

He  looked  a  long  time,  then  turned  down  the  hill.  In 
an  instant  the  brown  shadow  was  obscured  behind  a  fallen 
tree  trunk.  But  his  years  in  the  mountains  had  taught  him 
how  to  mark  down  a  place  and  move  right  toward  it.  No 
similarity  of  tree  trunk  or  shadow  or  brush  covert  could 
lead  him  astray. 

Then  the  sharp-eyed  magpies  that  chattered  in  the  branches 
— already  making  large  speeches  about  their  winter  plans 
when  they  should  get  to  the  southern  resorts — might  have 
beheld  a  curious  shock  and  pain  strike  the  old  mountaineer's 
face.  His  eyes  suddenly  clouded.  His  bronzed  brow  was 
furrowed.     For  he  thought  he  had  come  to  the  end  of  a 


280     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

trail  that  for  the  past  half-dozen  years  had  given  him  such 
delight  to  follow. 

Broad  antlers  would  sweep  no  more  through  his  native 
forest.  The  monarchs  of  the  woods  had  fallen  at  last; 
their  reigns  were  done.  After  all  his  effort  to  preserve  them, 
the  two  noblest  elk  of  the  little  remaining  band  had  met  a 
tragic  end.  They  were  lying,  close  together,  in  the  dead 
pine  needles.  Not  a  quiver  of  a  flank  told  him  that  life 
remained  in  their  great  bodies. 

He  understood  in  a  moment.  The  antlers  were  tightly 
locked.  It  was  apparent  the  two  patriarchs  had  died  of 
hunger  and  thirst. 

He  came  near,  very  sorrowfully,  and  looked  down  at 
the  majestic  forms.  Evidently  death  had  been  but  a  recent 
claimant.  The  buzzards  had  not  yet  descended,  and  usually 
they  are  very  prompt.  Yet  their  forms  were  wasted,  as  if 
by  days  of  starvation. 

Then  old  Nathan  Funk  opened  his  drooping  lips  and 
shouted  with  joy.  For  one  of  the  elk — the  larger,  although 
the  points  on  his  antlers  were  not  so  many — had  opened  his 
great,  brown,  tender  eyes. 

Nathan  did  not  ordinarily  move  swiftly.  He  had  learned 
from  the  wild  creatures  a  certain  smoothness  and  ease  of 
motion  that  is  a  wonderful  saver  of  animal  energy.  At 
that  moment,  he  seemed  to  come  to  life.  He  sprang  over 
the  fallen  logs  as  a  deer  springs  from  beneath  the  talons 
of  a  cougar.  Then  he  knelt  beside  the  great,  broad-antlered 
head  of  Baby  Bill.     He  touched  the  soft  flesh  of  the  throat. 

It  was  still  warm.  The  animal  was  hovering  at  the  very 
frontier  of  death,  yet  enough  life  remained  to  enable  him 
to  follow  the  man's  motions  with  his  eyes.  There  was 
no  fear  in  them,  however.    Fear  is  a  matter  of  self-preserva- 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  281 

tion, — and  Baby  Bill  had  forgotten  it  in  the  shadow  of  death. 
It  seemed  to  Nathan  that  the  soft  eyes  were  appealing  to 
him  for  help. 

"Keep  up  the  old  spirit,  Baby  Bill,"  the  man  said  swiftly. 
"I'll  have  you  loose  in  a  minute.    We'll  save  you  yet." 

Then  Nathan  passed  to  the  body  of  the  herd  leader ;  the 
skin  was  cold.  Not  a  flicker  of  life  remained.  For  a  mo- 
ment he  worked  to  separate  the  horns,  but  he  couldn't  move 
the  great  bodies  enough  to  effect  it.  Then  with  his  hand 
axe  he  broke  the  tines  of  the  dead  elk's  antlers.  In  a  mo- 
ment, Baby  Bill  was  free.  But  he  did  not  get  up.  No 
strength  remained  in  the  powerful  form  for  that. 

To  a  man  of  less  determination,  the  attempt  to  save  Baby 
Bill's  life  would  have  been  given  up  at  this  stage.  The  elk 
was  evidently  too  weak  to  nourish, — and  besides,  he  was  only 
a  dumb  animal  anyway.  But  the  issue  went  deep  with 
Nathan.  He  was  a  lonely  man,  his  loves  and  hatreds  were  the 
simple,  heart-devouring,  primitive  emotions  of  the  mountain 
people ;  and  this  great  elk  he  had  named  was  one  of  his  few 
interests. 

It  has  been  written  by  the  first  Judges  of  the  Forest  that 
man  loves  most  the  things  he  owns,  be  it  his  humble  home, 
his  rock-strewn  farm,  his  sons,  his  horse  or  his  dog.  Any 
sacrifice  or  effort  is  justified  for  one  of  these.  Old  Nathan 
felt  an  actual  sense  of  possession  in  the  great  stag  he 
had  protected  as  a  fawn,  and  named,  and  guarded  all  through 
its  earlier  years, — and  nothing  must  be  left  undone  to  save 
his  life. 

He  hurried  to  the  spring  and  filled  his  hat  with  water. 
Forcing  the  elk's  lips  apart  he  poured  it,  a  little  at  a  time, 
into  the  throat.  The  effect  was  really  astonishing.  At 
the  first  swallow  Baby  Bill   coughed  and  quivered  in  his 


282     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

bed.  Nathan  went  back  for  another  hatful,  which  he  ad- 
ministered in  the  same  slow  way.  When  the  third  was  swal- 
lowed, the  stag  was  able  to  lift  his  muzzle  an  inch  or  so 
off  the  ground.  Nathan  was  trembling  with  delight  when 
he  went  back  for  the  fourth. 

He  thought  it  was  probable  that  much  reserve  strength 
still  lingered  in  the  elk's  body.  Possibly  it  had  worn  itself 
to  utter  exhaustion,  weakened  as  it  had  been  by  lack  of 
food  and  water,  by  a  frenzied  effort  to  shake  free  from  the 
dead  elk.  The  older  animal,  lacking  in  Baby  Bill's  vitality, 
had  perished  the  night  before. 

When  Baby  Bill's  thirst  was  satiated,  Nathan  took  out 
his  handkerchief,  tied  it  on  the  dead  limb  of  a  tree  and  thrust 
it  up  as  a  banner  beside  the  bodies.  He  didn't  wish  to 
take  chances  on  any  cougar  or  wolf  discovering  Baby  Bill 
in  his  absence.  The  fluttering  cloth  would  keep  the  beasts 
of  prey  at  a  distance  for  a  few  hours.  Then  he  hurried 
to  his  cabin. 

He  came  back  heavily  laden,  with  blankets,  food  for 
himself,  a  few  cooking  utensils  and  a  number  of  incidentals 
for  use  in  treating  Baby  Bill.  He  made  his  camp  within 
a  few  feet  of  the  two  bodies,  first  pulling  away,  little  by 
little,  the  dead  herd  leader.  Next  he  built  a  high  fire.  He 
knew  that  warmth,  above  all  else,  would  bring  back  life 
to  the  weakened  tissue  of  the  stag. 

It  was  a  long  week's  work  before  Nathan  knew  he  had 
succeeded.  His  coffee  went  creamless  that  week,  for  he 
poured  all  his  cans  of  evaporated  milk  down  the  throat  of 
the  elk.  Then  came  the  time  when  the  animal  could  raise 
its  head  and  munch  the  tender  grass  its  nurse  had  cut. 
At  the  end  of  ten  days,  Baby  Bill  was  able  to  stand  for  a 
few  minutes  on  his  feet. 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  283 

The  first  snow  fell  that  night,  but  quickly  melted  in 
the  little,  cold  shower  of  rain  which  followed.  It  was  per- 
fectly evident  that  Nathan  could  not  remain  many  more 
days  to  treat  his  patient.  Winter  was  breaking  swiftly,  and 
a  man  wants  warm  walls  and  a  fireplace  during  the  winters 
of  the  plateaus.  One  day  he  returned  to  his  cabin  for  his 
snowshoes, — to  get  him  out  of  the  glen  in  case  of  emergency. 

One  result  of  this  little  episode  even  Nathan  had  not 
anticipated.  In  his  days  of  weakness,  Baby  Bill  had  lost 
all  fear  of  his  nurse.  There  are  few  creatures  in  the  whole 
animal  world  more  easily  domesticated  than  the  deer,  which 
respond  more  quickly  to  tenderness  and  care.  Evidently 
Baby  Bill  had  accepted  Nathan  as  a  protector  and  guardian 
for  life.  The  first  walking  he  did  was  to  follow  the  front- 
iersman, just  as  a  dog  follows  his  master,  in  his  work  about 
the  camp. 

"This  won't  do,"  Nathan  told  him  once  in  immeasurable 
delight;  "I  can't  have  you  for  a  lap-dog,  you  big,  thousand- 
pound  brute." 

Baby  Bill  began  to  range  farther  from  the  camp,  but  he 
returned  nightly,  when  fear  came  on  the  wind,  to  Nathan's 
protection.  Strength  came  back  to  the  knitted  muscles; 
spirit  returned  to  the  great  eyes. 

One  morning,  waking  to  find  three  inches  of  snow  over 
his  coverlet,  Nathan  knew  it  was  time  to  leave  the  stag 
to  his  own  devices. 

"Good-by,  old  fellow,"  he  said  when  his  supplies  were 
packed.  He  caressed  the  great  neck.  "I've  brought  you 
through,  Baby  Bill,  as  one  Elk  must  to  another" — a  smile 
lingered  on  his  tanned  face — "because  I  haven't  forgotten 
why  I  named  you  Bill.  And  now  you  have  to  shift  for  your- 
self." 


284     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

He  turned  down  the  trail.  But  he  looked  back  after  he 
had  gone  one  hundred  yards.  He  wanted  to  see  once  more 
the  stately  form,  the  long  sweep  of  majestic  antlers  that 
would  soon  fall  before  the  will  of  Manitou.  He  was  as- 
tonished to  find  the  great  fellow  plugging  Contentedly 
along  behind  him. 

"Good  Lord,  Bill!'*  he  cried.  "This  won't  do  at  all. 
I've  fed  you  all  I'm  going  to,  and  I'm  going  home.  You 
run  away  and  find  that  herd  you've  earned  the  right  to 
rule." 

It  became  necessary  to  throw  sticks  and  stones  at  the 
great  bull  before  he  could  be  made  to  know  his  presence 
was  no  longer  desired.  And  feeling  some  way  deeply  lonely, 
Nathan  Funk  hastened  to  his  cabin. 

The  waterfowl  had  passed,  and  winter  was  at  hand. 
Baby  Bill  had  not  yet  found  his  herd.  A  few  inches  of 
snow  had  fallen,  which  had  been  a  signal  for  them  to  de- 
scend to  the  lower  foothills.  The  great  elk  munched  for 
a  few  days  on  the  top  of  the  shrubbery,  grubbing  through 
the  snow  for  grass,  and  then  he  himself  turned  down  the 
trail. 

The  chill  of  early  winter  was  over  the  mountains  and 
the  joy  of  living  was  at  its  height.  Baby  Bill  had  never 
felt  so  proud  before.  He  had  conquered  the  bull  leader, 
and  he  knew  he  had  only  to  overtake  the  herd  to  become 
its  leader.  Again  the  cougar  would  flee  from  his  path ;  and 
for  the  time  being,  in  the  glory  of  his  new  strength,  he 
quite  forgot  the  wolf  pack.  However,  no  one  can  forget 
the  wolf  pack  forever.  So  long  as  winter  comes  to  the 
wilderness,  the  wolves  will  keep  their  grim  watch. 

Just  as  dawn  broke,  one  icy  day,  Baby  Bill  heard  them 
calling  on  the  ridge. 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  285 

For  an  instant  he  stood  quite  still,  shivering.  It  was  the 
same  old  rising  and  falling  chant,  the  most  typical  of  all 
the  wilderness  voices.  The  pack  had  gathered,  and  it  was 
hungry. 

The  stag  stole  on,  taking  advantage  of  all  the  brush 
coverts.  He  did  not  want  the  long-range  eyes  of  the  wolves 
to  catch  sight  of  his  shadow  on  the  snow.  He  had  almost 
forgotten  the  meaning  of  terror  in  the  weeks  he  had  spent 
under  the  guardianship  of  Nathan  Funk,  for  no  harm 
could  come  to  him  then.  But  in  an  instant  all  his  inborn 
fear  returned. 

The  call  was  not  a  new  voice  to  him — he  had  heard  it 
many  times  before — but  always  before  the  pack  had  failed 
to  find  his  trail.  He  knew  perfectly  the  fate  of  those  whose 
trail  they  did  find.    The  hair  crept  along  his  spine. 

All  at  once  he  leaped  forward  in  a  frenzy.  The  pack 
suddenly  bayed  behind  him,  a  cry  that  even  a  tenderfoot 
could  not  have  mistaken.  They  had  crossed  his  tracks  at 
last.  From  then  on  the  chase  was  a  trial  of  speed  and  en- 
durance. The  elk's  body  stretched  out,  the  powerful  limbs 
contracted,  the  horns  lay  back  over  the  shoulders. 

He  was,  however,  running  a  losing  race.  The  wolves 
were  ineffably  patient.  They  had  only  to  follow  the  trail, 
hour  on  hour,  with  victory  certain  in  the  end.  No  tricks 
of  back-tracking  could  bewilder  them;  and  the  elk  would 
ultimately  tire  out.  At  noon,  or  at  night,  or  the  next  day's 
noon,  they  would  come  up  to  him,  at  bay  at  last  or  fallen 
from  exhaustion.  There  were  no  rivers  on  this  side  of  the 
divide  where  he  could  find  refuge.  The  ice  of  the  dawn 
had  blasted  the  one  hope  the  elk  had  left;  it  had  made  a 
thick  crust  of  ice  over  the  lakes  wherein  otherwise  he  might 
find  refuge. 


286     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

The  wolves  bayed  again,  and  swung  merrily  on  the  trail. 

The  same  crisp  dawn  found  Nathan  Funk  walking  across 
the  snow  fields  toward  a  little  frontier  store  far  beyond  the 
marshy  end  of  Lake  of  the  Woods.  It  was  his  last  trip, 
for  the  greater  part  of  his  winter's  supplies  had  already  been 
laid  in.  It  isn't  well  to  attempt  to  winter  in  the  moun- 
tains with  a  half-empty  larder.  The  deer  descend  to  the 
foothills,  and  the  snow  has  a  way  of  lying  in  impassable 
drifts  far  into  the  spring. 

He  hadn't  thought  it  necessary  to  take  his  snowshoes.  As 
the  snow  was  only  a  few  inches  deep,  he  could  make  better 
time  without  them.  He  didn't  think  it  likely  that  the  snow 
would  become  impassable  before  night.  If  it  did,  he  could 
borrow  a  pair  of  snowshoes  for  his  return  trip.  He  hastened 
down  the  long  ridge  to  the  shores  of  the  lake  and  paused 
for  a  moment  to  wonder  at  the  depth  of  ice.  Wrapped  in 
his  warm  mackinaw,  he  didn't  realize  that  the  temperature 
was  down  to  zero. 

All  at  once  he  became  aware  that  clouds  were  deepen- 
ing above  him.  They  lay  in  heavy  banks,  promising  snowfall 
before  the  night.  Unless  he  hurried,  it  might  be  necessary 
to  borrow  a  pair  of  snowshoes  after  all,  a  proceeding  that 
would  necessitate  a  tedious  trip  to  return  them.  So  he 
turned  a  little  from  his  course,  intending  to  save  time  by 
a  short  cut  across  the  marsh. 

A  large  flock  of  probably  two  hundred  mallards  rose  with 
a  thunder  of  wings.  Evidently  they  had  been  sitting  on  the 
ice  crust  that  covered  the  shallow  pools  of  the  marsh.  He 
watched  their  even  flight  until  the  cloud  banks  obscured 
them. 

He  then  dipped  down  into  the  tules.  There  is  a  strange 
melancholy  about  the  tule  lands.     They  are  so  brown,  so 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  287 

bleak,  and  the  wind  has  an  unfamiliar  note  as  it  brushes 
across  them.  No  man  who  has  heard  the  stir  of  tules  in  the 
wind  and  the  soft  wail  that  is  the  overtone  of  the  gale 
itself,  can  possibly  forget  them. 

A  strange  loneliness  came  over  Nathan,  a  sense  of  in- 
finite isolation.  The  earth  trembled  and  rocked  beneath  his 
feet.  Yet  it  was  only  a  narrow  strip  of  marsh,  and  in  a 
moment  more  he  would  be  upon  the  firm  hillside.  Again 
a  flock  of  ducks  rose  before  him,  and  he  lifted  his  eyes  to 
watch  them.  He  had  not  particularly  noticed  that  he  had 
come  upon  a  strip  of  marsh  where  the  tule  growth  was  al- 
most entirely  absent.  He  was  walking  on  the  snow-covered 
ice  of  one  of  the  many  little  potholes  found  in  all  the  lake- 
region  marshes,  and  only  became  aware  of  it  when  the 
ice  broke  suddenly  beneath  his  step.  Unlike  the  lower  lake 
ice,  it  was  the  thinnest  crust.  Because  of  the  water  beneath 
that  had  melted  the  snow  as  it  fell,  the  white  covering  was 
equally  shallow. 

Nathan  leaped  in  sudden  realization  of  peril.  He  had 
waded  into  one  of  the  quagmire  pools,  those  bottomless 
morasses  all  residents  of  the  marshes,  sooner  or  later,  learn 
to  dread.  His  reflexes  had  been  perfect.  He  had  leaped 
in  the  single  second  of  his  descent.  But  the  quagmire  had 
already  closed  around  his  knees  and  he  fell  forward  from 
his  hips. 

The  terror  of  the  mud  lies  in  the  lack  of  traction.  Any 
effort  to  obtain  leverage  only  results  in  sinking  farther 
into  the  mire.  Nathan  knew  well  enough  not  to  make  a 
frenzied  struggle.  His  long  years  in  the  mountains  had 
disciplined  his  self-control,  and  his  first  effort  was  by  lean- 
ing forward  to  check  his  descent. 

He  had  already  dropped  almost  to  his  hips,  but  because 


288     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

of  the  increasing  resistance  of  the  mire,  his  descent  was 
almost  impeded.  With  one  hand  he  seized  the  roots  of 
some  aquatic  plants,  the  other  still  held  his  rifle. 

After  the  first  moment  of  blind  terror  had  passed,  when 
the  full  realization  of  his  predicament  had  been  brought 
home  to  him,  it  occurred  that  he  might  thrust  his  gun  into 
the  mire  to  use  as  a  pry.  His  will  dispatched  the  message, 
but  long  training  kept  his  arm  still  lifted.  In  the  first 
place,  the  mire  was  especially  deep,  and  the  end  of  the 
butt  would  not  afford  as  much  resistance  as  one  of  his  boots. 
The  gun  would  soon  be  choked  with  the  mud,  and  all  his 
wilderness  training  forbade  any  action  that  would  take  away 
his  means  of  self-defense.  The  snow  was  over  the  lake  re- 
gion, and  the  pack  had  gathered. 

Slowly,  as  the  cold  descended  upon  him,  the  lines  deep- 
ened in  his  dark  face.  He  knew  where  he  stood.  There 
is  no  more  deserted  region  in  the  whole  United  States  than 
the  great  pine  belt  between  Lake  of  the  Woods  and  the 
Klamath  Lakes,  when  winter  snows  have  made  the  few 
mountain  roads  impassable.  His  one  hope  was  that  some 
trappti  or  hunter,  by  the  fortune  of  the  gods,  would  pass 
in  hearing  and  give  him  aid. 

The  frozen  mire  was  chilling  his  blood.  The  hand  that 
grasped  the  tule  roots  already  seemed  numb  from  the  icy 
water.    And  the  wind  wept  as  it  swept  over  the  reeds. 

Very  carefully  he  counted  in  his  mind  his  supply  of 
rifle  cartridges;  his  gun  held  six.  It  was  loaded  and  ready. 
He  had,  perhaps,  twenty  others  in  his  pockets,  more  than 
is  usually  carried  by  a  wayfarer  in  the  mountains.  Some 
of  these  might  be  expended  in  the  old  distress  signal  with 
which  most  frontiersmen  are  familiar.     The  gun,  however, 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  289 

must  be  kept  full  for  any  foes  that  might  discover  him  in 
his  helplessness. 

Seemingly  without  conscious  effort  he  heard  himself  say- 
ing, "Funk,  it's  the  end.    You've  reached  the  end." 

His  eyes  were  clear,  and  he  saw  the  truth.  The  cold 
was  descending  upon  him.  Soon  the  snows  would  follow. 
By  no  power  of  mortal  strength  could  he  extricate  him- 
self from  the  mire.  There  was  no  food;  and  death  comes 
quickly  in  the  mountain  nights  to  unprotected  hungry  men. 
Not  even  the  bull  elk,  lying  with  antlers  caught  in  the 
antlers  of  his  foe,  had  been  in  such  a  perilous  predica- 
ment as  he.  Aid  had  come  to  the  elk  after  many  days, 
but  none  was  to  come  to  him;  even  the  elk  himself  could 
not  pay  back  his  debt. 

The  marsh  where  he  lay  was  far  distant  from  the  trails 
of  men.  Not  even  hunters  would  come  here.  And  they  must 
come  soon,  too, — for  the  cold  could  not  be  endured  long. 
The  only  remaining  consolation  was  one  so  strange  and  eery 
that  the  wind  might  have  brought  it  across  the  tules:  it 
was  the  thought  of  the  last  bullet  in  his  rifle  magazine,  a 
swift  and  certain  victory  in  uttermost  despair. 

There  was  no  heat  in  the  sun  that  climbed  the  sky  that 
morning.  The  clouds  lay  between.  The  wind  blew,  and 
died  away,  and  blew  again  in  many  little  storms  all  after- 
noon. About  noon  a  flock  of  geese  passed  low  over  the  marsh 
and  wailed  down  to  the  dark  face  they  saw  among  the 
tules. 

"Thou  knowest  now,"  their  strange  wail  might  have  said. 
"Thou  knowest  the  marshes  as  we  know  them,  and  the 
death  that  stalks  across  them." 

Yes,  he  knew.  Old  Nathan  Funk  now  understood  why 
the  cry  of  the  geese  was  so  eery  and  sad  in  winter. 


290     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

He  tried  to  shift  in  his  position  and  relieve  his  strain- 
ing muscles.  He  only  sank  deeper  in  the  mire.  For  the 
first  hour  there  had  been  the  agony  of  cold  and  fatigue; 
but  this  had  quite  passed  by  now.  The  cold  water  and 
the  cold  earth  had  possessed  a  grim  mercy  for  their  prisoner. 
Already  their  chill  had  stolen  into  him  and,  for  a  moment 
at  least,  numbed  his  nerves  and  muscles. 

He  was  clear  to  his  waist  in  the  mire,  practically  out 
of  sight  of  any  one  on  the  shore.  He  had  slipped  down, 
little  by  little  and  almost  imperceptibly,  during  the  first 
hour  in  the  marsh.  By  now  the  mud  had  seemingly  con- 
gealed about  him,  and  it  was  no  longer  necessary  for  him 
to  hold  to  the  tule  roots.  The  water  of  the  pool  was  almost 
up  to  his  armpits. 

Shortly  after  twelve  o'clock,  he  fired  a  dozen  of  his 
rifle  shells  in  signals.  Each  shot  reechoed  endlessly,  with 
strange,  tremulous  shudderings  across  the  marshes,  but  there 
was  no  other  response.  He  had  a  dozen  shots  remaining, 
six  in  the  gun  and  six  buttoned  into  the  game  pocket  of 
his  mackinaw  shirt.  To  get  at  these  he  had  to  open  his 
coat,  which  would  permit  the  full  chill  of  the  water  to 
flow  in  next  to  his  skin.  And  it  wasn't  worth  the  added 
cold  and  discomfort.  If  the  report  of  the  signals  could 
have  carried  ten  miles  in  each  direction,  there  would  be 
no  one  to  hear  him  or  come  to  his  aid. 

"It's  the  end,"  he  said  again — and  he  spoke  the  truth. 
Unconsciousness  was  sweeping  over  him.  The  moment  he 
lost  the  power  to  call  out,  the  last,  feeble,  flickering  hope 
of  help  was  gone.  Even  a  passer-by  could  not  see  him, 
obscured  as  he  was  by  the  brown  reeds. 

A  moment's  shuddering  terror  passed  over  him,  and  he 
dispelled  the  falling  mists  with  the  power  of  his  will.    Long 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  291 

hours  of  agony,  between  wakefulness  and  unconsciousness, 
might  be  his  fate  if  he  allowed  himself  to  drop  off. — There 
was  a  better  way.  Then  he  smiled  a  little,  facing  the  dark 
forest  on  the  ridge  beyond. 

He  had  been  an  old  companion  of  these  wilds.  They  had 
conquered  him  at  last,  just  as  they  conquered  all  things  in 
the  end.  The  whole  wilderness  world  seemed  darkening 
with  shadows. 

All  at  once  he  started,  and  opened  his  eyes.  Tingling 
through  the  frosty  air  he  heard  the  far-off  bay  of  the  wolf 
pack.  They  were  chasing  game,  and  some  way  it  seemed 
altogether  fitting  that  he  should  hear  their  song  in  his  last 
hour  of  life.  They  were  the  very  spirits  of  the  wilder- 
ness, the  old,  dread  terrors  of  the  snow,  and  their  voices 
represented  the  cry  of  triumph  of  the  wild  that  had  con- 
quered him  at  last. 

His  hands  gripped  tighter  on  his  rifle.  It  might  be  that 
their  keen  noses  would  tell  them  of  his  presence,  and  many 
and  terrible  are  the  stories  of  men  who  have  been  left 
helpless  in  the  track  of  wolves.  They  always  seemed  to 
know,  by  some  satanic  cunning,  who  was  helpless  and  who 
was  armed.     They  might  wish  to  speed  his  departure. 

They  bayed  again;  and  he  knew  that  they  were  already 
on  the  track  of  game.  Their  cries  were  wild,  triumphant, 
as  if  they  had  almost  overtaken  their  quarry.  As  yet  the 
timbered  ridge  obscured  them  from  his  sight. 

Nathan  had  interpreted  their  cry  quite  correctly.  They 
had  almost  overtaken  their  great  game.  It  was  the  hour 
of  despair,  not  only  for  Nathan  but  for  the  monarch  of  the 
forest,  the  great  bull  elk  he  had  befriended. 

Baby  Bill  was  at  the  last  stage  of  a  long,  hard  race. 
He  had   gained   at   first.      The  wolves,    running  by   scent 


292     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

on  his  track,  had  not  been  able  to  go  swiftly;  but  living 
flesh  is  not  constructed  to  endure  many  hours  of  such  a 
killing  pace.  At  first  he  had  flown, — a  graceful  thing 
with  wings,  that  hardly  seemed  to  touch  the  ground  with 
his  hoofs.  Soon,  however,  the  eyes  started  and  the  nostrils 
reddened;  and  his  heart  seemed  to  shiver  to  pieces  at  every 
beat.  Finally  he  fell  short  in  a  leap,  and  sprawled,  pant- 
ing, to  the  ground. 

Meanwhile  the  wolves  had  neither  paused  nor  hurried. 
They  kept  an  easy  gallop,  seemingly  not  swift  or  hurried, 
but  which  sped  the  long  miles  beneath  them.  Sometimes 
they  chorused  but  mostly  ran  in  silence.  They  already 
seemed  to  know  that  their  victory  was  assured.  The  lakes 
were  frozen,  and  their  own  muscles  were  tireless.  They 
would  dine  at  the  end  of  the  trail. 

The  stag  heard  them  bay  again,  and  leaped  up.  Again  he 
gained.  But  this  time  exhaustion  came  more  quickly.  Still 
the  wolves  followed  the  trail.  They  didn't  seem  like  mere 
living  animals.  They  Tan  so  steadily,  so  tirelessly,  that 
they  began  to  partake  of  the  quality  of  some  inexorable 
spirits  of  the  snow,  never  to  be  shaken  off,  grim  agents  of 
Fate  itself. 

Twice  more  Baby  Bill  ran  to  exhaustion,  and  each  time, 
when  he  paused  to  rest,  the  pack  was  nearer.  The  long 
morning  drew  till  afternoon.  For  the  third  time  the  pack 
caught  sight  of  him  as  he  sprang  up  to  run  again. 

The  whole  gray  band  seemed  to  leap  forward.  It  was 
the  last  lap  of  the  race,  with  certain  conquest  in  the  end. 
The  wolves  had  seemingly  sped  swiftly  before;  now  they 
leaped  like  grayhounds  about  the  margin  of  the  lake.  The 
elk  taxed  all  his  magnificent  strength  for  a  last,  furious  ef- 
fort.    But  he  was  already  exhausted,  and  the  pack,  running 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  293 

at  top  speed,  did  not  fall  behind  again.  The  long  pur- 
suit evidently  had  net  tired  them  at  all. 

The  mountains  rang  with  the  hunting  song:  the  old, 
triumphant  cry  of  the  pack  sure  of  its  game.  It  carried  far 
across  the  waste  of  tules;  and  Nathan  Funk,  shaking  off 
the  rising  mists  of  unconsciousness,  gripped  his  gun  the 
tighter. 

The  wolves  might  have  been  puzzled  by  a  curious  change 
of  direction  in  the  elk's  course.  At  first  Baby  Bill  had 
sped  toward  the  lake,  as  all  his  instincts  had  prompted  him 
to  do.  But  he  did  not  find  the  glint  of  water  in  which  he 
might  swim  to  safety.  He  only  saw  the  wide,  white  sweep 
of  snow;  and  it  was  wholly  possible  his  brute  intelligence 
did  not  even  extend  far  enough  to  interpret  the  glittering 
surface  as  that  of  the  lake.  At  least,  he  did  not  venture 
upon  the  ice.  Instead  he  turned  down  the  trail  at  its  mar- 
gin, toward  the  ridge  beyond. 

The  wolves,  if  they  had  done  any  thinking  about  the 
matter  at  all,  would  certainly  have  expected  him  to  follow 
down  the  trail  until  they  overtook  him,  somewhere  between 
the  lake  and  the  top  of  the  ridge.  There  was  no  hope  of 
safety  in  the  less-pronounced  trails  to  the  right  or  left.  Yet 
to  their  surprise,  the  great  bull  suddenly  turned  to  the  right, 
across  a  narrow  neck  of  tule-grown  marsh. 

The  explanation  for  this  strange  procedure  goes  too  deep 
into  the  multiple  mystery  of  animal  motive  and  intelligence 
to  be  explained  easily.  The  truth  was  that  running  along 
the  lake-side  trail,  he  had  encountered  the  cold  track  of 
Nathan  Funk  who  had  passed  this  way  early  in  the  morn- 
ing. No  man  may  tell  what  impulses  its  dying  smell  aroused 
in  the  nervous  system  of  the  animal,  yet  a  certain  measure 


294    The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

of  reaction,  a  certain  stir  and  impulse  in  the  memory  must 
have  been  the  result. 

It  was  Nathan's  hour  of  trial,  and  perhaps  Baby  Bill 
recalled  another  hour  when  death  was  a  near  shadow,  when 
the  man  of  this  same  smell  had  been  his  protector.  No  hu- 
man being  understands  enough  of  the  psychology  of  animals 
to  say  for  certain  that  the  stag  did  not  consciously  recog- 
nize the  track  of  the  man  who  had  befriended  and  fed  him 
in  the  previous  month,  and  in  this  last,  final  moment  of  ter- 
ror his  first  impulse  was  to  return  to  his  protection.  For 
the  truth  remained,  where  Nathan  Funk  had  turned  off 
across  the  marsh,  his  footprints  distinct  in  the  soft  mire 
of  the  marsh,  the  bull  elk  turned  off,  too. 

Nathan  Funk,  the  life  dying  out  of  him  as  a  fire  dies, 
waited  to  see  the  wolf-pack  for  the  last  time.  The  long 
afternoon  was  almost  at  its  close.  The  sky  had  the  old 
familiar  bleakness  and  half-dusk  that  precedes  the  winter 
sunset.  The  hunting-song  chorused  through  the  crisp  at- 
mosphere, and  Nathan  felt  that  when  its  last  note  had  died, 
the  long  trail  of  his  own  life  would  end. 

He  knew  perfectly  by  no  mercy  of  the  forest-gods  could 
he  survive  the  night  in  his  present  condition.  He  was  wet 
through  and  freezing,  and  no  pity  was  ever  met  in  the 
bitter  cold  of  the  mountain  night  that  would  descend  soon. 
All  his  life  he  had  studied  the  wild  things  of  the  forest — 
their  secret  lives,  their  natures,  their  battles,  their  eery 
dramas  in  the  dawns;  and  he  felt  the  curtain  was  going  up 
on  the  last  of  the  forest-dramas  he  would  ever  see.  In 
a  moment  the  game  the  pack  was  chasing  would  come  into 
sight,  following  the  trail  that  led  from  the  lake  margin. 
Then  a  few  seconds  later,  the  wolves  would  pass.  They 
had  now  almost  overtaken  their  game. 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  295 

He  waited,  silent.  Then  he  uttered  a  long,  hoarse,  shud- 
dering gasp  of  amazement. 

The  quarry  had  suddenly  burst  forth  in  clear  sight.  Na- 
than knew  him  at  the  first  glance.  He  could  not  mistake 
the  powerful  form,  the  fleet  legs,  the  majestic  spread  of 
antlers:  it  was  Baby  Bill,  the  elk  which  had  been  the  great- 
est interest  of  his  latter  years.  His  trail,  also,  was  almost 
at  the  end. 

The  sight  did  not  make  his  own  passing  any  easier.  He 
had  hoped  for  great  things  from  Baby  Bill.  The  elk  had 
been  in  his  thoughts  many  times  through  the  long  after- 
noon, and  it  had  pleased  his  soaring  fancy  to  think  of  the 
magnificent  bull  elk  living  on,  winter  after  winter,  and  con- 
trolling ever  more  of  the  forest. 

In  that  unclouded  vision  that  men  have  in  their  dying 
hours — a  vision  so  clear  that  to  misted  mortal  gaze  it  seems 
strange  and  distorted — his  mind  had  been  full  of  mental 
pictures  of  the  forest  king.  He  saw  him  in  his  revels;  the 
long  wild  races  in  the  dawns;  the  stealing  grazings  in  the 
moonlight;  the  battles  in  the  rutting  season.  It  is  not  good 
to  leave  one's  home  in  stranger's  hands.  In  some  dim  way 
it  had  been  a  consolation  to  Nathan  that  he  could  leave  the 
forest  region  he  loved  to  the  bull  elk.  Baby  Bill  would  know 
its  springs,  its  shadows  in  the  dusk,  its  frosts  in  the  dawns. 
But  now,  a  last  blow  from  the  skies,  he  was  to  see  the 
great  stag  perish  before  his  eyes ! 

The  thought  had  not  fully  gone  home,  however,  when  a 
new  development  in  the  race  brought  a  sudden,  overwhelm- 
ing leap  to  his  heart.  The  elk  turned  on  the  trail,  and 
came  straight  toward  him.  Of  course,  he  was  still  running 
along  his  protector's  trail;  and  the  man  knew,  with  a  sud- 


296     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

den  burst  of  savage  rapture,  he  was  to  have  a  part  to  play 
in  this  last  drama  after  all. 

Already  the  wolves  had  burst  from  the  timber,  and  follow- 
ing the  elk,  they  came  straight  toward  him. 

Events  came  quickly  thereafter.  He  tore  open  his  woolen 
shirt,  thanking  God  for  the  extra  shells  he  carried  in  his 
pocket.  He  snatched  them  and  dropped  them  into  a  side 
pocket  where  they  would  be  immediately  available. 

The  stag  sped  straight  toward  Nathan,  still  unaware  of  his 
presence,  for  the  tules  hid  his  head  and  shoulders,  the  only 
parts  of  him  that  protruded  above  the  pool.  Nathan  had  an 
instant's  wave  of  terror  that  the  great  stag  was  going  to 
tread  on  him.  It  reared  suddenly  up  above  the  tules,  im- 
mense, heroic;  then  splashed  down  in  the  water  beside  him. 

He  had  no  time  to  realize  that  the  elk,  following  his  trail, 
had  been  ensnared  in  the  same  pool  of  quagmire  which  had 
enveloped  him. 

"Hello,  Bill!"  Nathan  shrieked  in  rapture.  Uncon- 
sciously, he  had  given  the  greeting  that  members  of  the 
great  fraternal  order  to  which  both  belonged  were  wont 
to  exchange  in  their  good  nature.  "Lie  still,  and  don't  rear 
up,  so  I  can  shoot." 

It  was  a  strange  picture,  startlingly  clear  in  detail:  the 
yellow  marshes,  the  timber  stretching  beyond,  the  snow  fields 
with  the  gray  spirits  of  the  snow,  the  wolf  pack  bounding 
across  them;  and  the  elk  and  the  man,  side  by  side  in  the 
mire.  Already  Nathan's  rifle  was  at  his  shoulder,  the  barrel 
extending  over  the  body  of  the  exhausted  elk.  And  the 
finger  pressed  back  against  the  trigger! 

He  couldn't  miss.  In  the  first  place,  when  Nathan  Funk 
looked  along  his  gun  barrel  and  missed,  the  forest  people 
went  about  their  feeding  with  hushed  voices.    In  the  second, 


Brother  Bill  the  Elk  297 

the  wolves  were  almost  upon  the  elk.  Lacking  the  stature 
of  Baby  Bill,  they  did  not  see  the  man  at  all.  Nathan  held 
hard  to  restrain  a  shout  of  rapture,  and  drew  a  quick  bead 
on  the  leader  of  the  pack.  He  rolled  forward  and  lay  still 
at  the  edge  of  the  marsh. 

Quickly  the  end  of  the  barrel  leaped  to  one  side,  and 
then  spoke  again.  These  were  the  ancient  enemies  of  the 
elk,  and  Nathan  had  no  mercy.  The  second  wolf  died,  and 
the  others  slid  and  scattered  the  snow  as  they  tried  to  come 
to  an  abrupt  halt.  Some  turned,  offering  perfect  broadside 
shots.  Once  a  well-aimed  bullet  accounted  for  two, — one 
dead  and  one  dying  in  the  snow.  There  were  ten  individuals 
in  all ;  but  the  old  frontiersmen  who,  now  and  then,  when  the 
tobacco  is  mellow,  congregate  around  their  firesides  relate 
how,  with  phenomenal  accuracy,  Nathan  downed  them  all 
before  they  could  turn  out  of  the  marsh  and  reach  the  heavy 
timber,  a  quarter  of  a  mile  beyond.  Thus,  for  once,  the 
spirits  of  the  snow  were  conquered,  and  for  once,  the  Death 
that  lives  in  the  winter  cold  went  back  to  his  shadows  with 
lowered  wings. 

With  Baby  Bill's  great  body  to  climb  upon,  the  stout 
horns  to  seize  and  hold,  Nathan  climbed  out  of  the  mire.  It 
was  a  tremendous  effort.  Weakened  as  he  was,  it  took  the 
last  of  his  strength.  Before  the  twilight  fell  he  had  made 
it,  first  to  the  back  of  the  elk  that  shuddered  and  gasped 
with  terror,  but  could  not  move  in  the  imprisoning  mire,  and 
then  to  the  tule  turf  beyond.  Staggering  but  exultant,  he 
returned  to  his  cabin,  rested,  braced  himself  with  steaming 
coffee  and  food,  and  in  the  dawn  returned  with  a  rope  and  a 
saddle  horse. 

When  the  bull  elk  had  been  drawn  from  the  mire  and  lay 
exhausted  in  the  tules,  he  came  into  the  name  by  which 


298     The  Heart  of  Little  Shikara 

naturalists  were  to  know  him  in  years  to  come.  Uncon- 
sciously, he  had  afforded  an  avenue  of  escape  from  a  par- 
ticularly unhappy  and  untimely  death. 

Nathan  Funk  gave  the  name  to  him  as  he  lay  by  his 
side  in  the  tules,  meanwhile  kicking  him  softly  with  the  toe 
of  his  shoe  and  inquiring  why  he  didn't  go  and  take  a  bath 
in  some  running  stream  and  wash  the  mud  from  his  flanks. 
It  was  curious  that  Nathan  gave  no  thought  to  the  caked 
mire  which  besmeared  his  own  clothes,  clear  to  the  waist. 

"Brother,"  he  said  with  a  strange  note  in  his  voice,  "it's 
all  safe  now,  Bill.  The  pack's  dead,  and  the  country  is  all 
yours  without  any  one  to  question  you," — a  smile  lighted 
the  dark  face,— "Brother  Bill." 

There  are  no  wolves  to  bay  on  the  bull  elk's  trail  now. 
He  lives  his  own  life  and  rules  his  own  way,  and  his 
scepter  is  his  two  front  hoofs,  of  which  even  Woof  the  bear 
cannot  doubt  the  authority.  His  crown  is  a  magnificent 
spread  of  antlers  that  each  year  are  bigger  and  more  ma- 
jestic. Sometimes  fortunate  naturalists  catch  a  glimpse  of 
him,  leading  his  herd  through  the  forest's  trails.  And  if 
they  are  members  of  the  Order,  they  call  him  "Brother  Bill 
— the  Grand  Exalted  Ruler  of  the  Land  of  Sloughs." 


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